Just to clarify, this is not a post sponsored by Calphalon. It is, rather, an exclusive special offer for 10% off of the purchase of their products that they are sharing with me and readers of this site as a followup to their sponsorship of Eat, Write, Retreat, which took place this past weekend in Washington, DC.* I’ve been a long-time user of their pots and pans and was really excited at this chance to introduce you to their cookware, if you aren’t familiar with it. The promotional code for Calphalon.com is: C95926 (click to link to the site where you can use the code). Thank you so much to them for sharing this opportunity with all of us!
(Clearance Items and Gift Certificates do not qualify. Excludes John Boos & Co. Cannot be combined with other special offers or applied to previous purchases. Terms subject to change. Offer valid through June 6th, 2011.)
In our goodie bags for the conference I attended this past weekend was a 12″ round non-stick griddle from the Unison line (above). Just when I didn’t think that I needed anything else to add to my cookware collection, I decided to give this a try. One of the most appealing points is that it can go in the dishwasher. This means that I could have left it in the hands of my parents. It also means that I can safely let other folks cook with it without having to give the care instructions that I always have to impart. For those of you who have used their products in the past, you can recall that grey film that is instantly recognizable on the slate-colored surface of their pans when someone has washed them in the dishwasher.
When I was at my folks’ house after the conference, I took the opportunity to test-drive this pan. Truthfully, I was too intrigued to wait to get back to New York to try it out. One of the dishes I’ve always wanted to attempt is a potato-wrapped fish dish. I could have cooked it in a regular non-stick skillet, but I thought that this might just be the perfect pan in which to make it. I took a recipe that I’d seen Ann Burrell do on The Food Network and adapted it a bit. Instead of the halibut, I used sockeye salmon. Pretty much every other step was exactly the same. So, it probably isn’t completely perfect in the placement of the potatoes, which is more my skill level, but I thought that the gorgeous crispiness of the exterior and the richness of the salmon went together perfectly. Look at how beautifully it came out:
The pan was so easy to work with and cleaned up without any fuss at all. I can see it being useful for all sorts of cooking projects. The high sides would make it ideal for cooking sauces. The nature of the technology is to conduct heat efficiently, so that you can cook at lower heats but still get the same lovely crusts and browning that you might have to work harder at with other pans. At the 12″ size, it is roomy enough to hold several pieces of fish (like below) or meat or even cheese sandwiches to heat up.
As I mentioned, I’ve been using Calphalon for many, many years. Their pans were the first high-quality cookware that I purchased when I was putting together my kitchen battery when I was living on my own after college. I’m not all that kind to my pots and pans (although I do religiously wash them by hand), and these have stood the test of time. You’ve seen the 10″ non-stick pan holding a Greenmarket Fritatta. The stovetop grill pan is perfect for the Curried Lamb Burgers with Grilled Veggies, and the 8″ non-stick pan is just the right size for whipping up the Eggs with Sauteed Mushrooms, Spinach, and Taleggio for a special-treat breakfast (or even dinner).
Recently, I’ve also used some of their bakeware. Buying their muffin tin for my Spiced Pumpkin-Pecan Muffins was a great step up from the battered non-stick one I’d had for years. Brownies and Magic Cookie Bars have been baked in their 9×13″ cake pan, making lots and lots of people very happy. Countless batches of cookies have reached that perfect crispy exterior/chewy, warm interior combination tickling the tastebuds and brightening even the most gloomy of days after being cooked on their non-stick jelly roll pan. So, if you have been thinking about an upgrade to some of your baking materials, I can also attest to how well those work.
I haven’t really talked much in the past on this site about my favorite cookware, but I have to say that I’ve always found Calphalon products to work well and to be incredibly reliable. I also like that they are designed, if cared for properly, to last pretty much forever, unless you have a roommate who destroys them, as one of my former ones did. This is why I am so happy to share with you this opportunity to add some of their products to your kitchen. They are definitely worth the investment, as I discovered many years ago.
Buon appetito!
*By way of disclosure, I would like to add that Calphalon has also entered the participants in the Eat, Write, Retreat conference into a drawing for a dream kitchen giveaway. If I win this, I will definitely share this result with you, my readers.
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