Looks Delic
I have a thing for cooking in dutch ovens. Traditionally dutch ovens are used slow style cooking like braising meat or preparing a dish that gets assembled on the stove top and then roasted in the oven. I use them for those things but I also often use them in place of my stainless steel pots just because I love them.
The way they hold heat is like no other pot or pan. This makes them great for simmering sauces and soups. They also don’t have hot spots the way your regular cookware does when it’s not centered on the flame which is why I tend to reach for them when crisping chicken thighs (the all brown evenly!) Speaking of browning chicken, another little added bonus when doing messy work that creates endless oil splatter is that the walls of the dutch oven keep the oil in the pot instead of on the stove, backsplash, countertop and floors.
All these features are great and probably enough to sell any cook on the possibility of giving one a try but wait… there’s more! The enamel coating on the inside (the white part of the pot) is non-stick and it does not disappoint. We’ve all had a standard non-stick pan fail us once or twice – full disclosure mine did it this morning with scrambled eggs, oops! – but these dutch ovens just won’t do that to you. They are silky and forgiving to a whole new level. And for those times that you are doing heavy duty work in them and they get the dark brown wall splatter (you know what I’m talking about all my braised meat lovers ?) all you need to do is soak it in warm soapy water while you do the rest of the dishes and then it wipes right out. I’m sure there’s some people out there who say ‘That’s nice but you lost me at “soak it” ‘… well for YOU I have another treat… it’s dishwasher safe! Dump that dirty, grimy, stuck on wall gunked up pot in the dishwasher and walk away. It will come out good as new.
Are you convinced yet? You probably / definitely need to test one out for yourself. You will not regret the investment. The two pots I have here are the Le Creuset Oval Dutch Ovens that you can pick up at this link. The blue one is the color called Marseille and the orange is Flame. I have 4 sizes but the most universal and one I use most often is the blue one which is 6 3/4 quarts. The orange pot is 2 sizes bigger at 9 1/2 quarts which I tend to save for cooking bigger cuts of meat (think pork shoulder, leg of lamb and pot roast) or doubling recipes.
If you have a dutch oven that you love or if you grab one from the link above, let me know what you cook in it. We can gush over how great they are together!
