Help me break in my dutch oven
 

One of my father's day presents was a dutch oven. A combination of travel and bbq weather has kept me from using it yet. I'll be home for 2 weeks and the rains are starting to come back. Any recipe suggestions?

Steve,

If it's cast iron, don't forget to season it. I scrub them with soap and water, then rub them liberally with peanut oil. Then into a 375 oven for two or three hours and it's ready to go.

I have a recipe for a pork butt you cook, then shred up for tacos or wraps. It's at home, but I'll get it to you in the next day or two.

BTW, I'm headed up your way in a couple of weeks. I have taken a contracting job in B'ham (actually Bessemer) and will be commuting Mon-Fri for a while.

Did you get a Lodge or a Le Creuset one or some other?

As for seasoning, the Lodge ones come preseasoned. If you want to season it again, I thought normal veg oil at 200F for an hour would do the trick? You don't want an oil that gums up. I tend to use sunflower (avoid corn and canola/rapeseed). Not sure if peanut oil is that great because of its high burn point.

I like making lamb shanks and oxtail stews in them.

Oh yeah.......I definately like using Dutch Oven for Lamb Shanks! ^

We use our Lodge Dutch oven only outdoors with charcoal heat, primarily for cobbler desserts. Since you mentioned rain I'm thinking this type cooking is not what you're planning. Please advise.

I don't know. It's kind of pretty, blue enamel on the outside. I hate to get it all black and smudgy. Can't I do cobbler indoors?

This thread belongs in Omni

LOL. I think everyone was assuming that this was a standard cast-iron variety Dutch oven. ;) If you haven't tried making cobbler in one of those using coals, you wouldn't know how much better it can be than the oven variety.

Fo stove-top applications, I usually make chili in mine...and the recipe is somewhere in Omni. :)

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Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide

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Is it white enamel on the inside too? Need to watch the heat applied if it's a Le Creuset since the enamel can melt.

You also need to keep grease and other liquids off the outside as much as you can as these can bake on (and is really difficult to remove).

Remember never to use soap to clean it inside if it's cast iron, and only use coarse salt and a cloth to clean up any food stains.

I believe it's cast aluminum. It was a surprise even though I'd asked for one in the past. I know there have been times I've passed on recipes that called for something to be started on the stovetop and then transferred to the oven. Since Mrs BamaVol is in charge of cleanup, I thought she'd appreciate one less item to wash.

I've had cobbler from the campfire. I was a boyscout for a few years and a couple of the BamaVol Jr's made it through Cubs before losing interest. Campfire cobbler was probably responsible for all of us sticking it out one more year than we would have otherwise. ;)

What are you using for a heat source? Since getting my first 'nice' range 3 years ago, I've regularly used my 15-year-old Le Creuset dutch oven on a 15,000 BTU burner at full blast, and I've never had any enamel melting issues.

I personally haven't melted any of my enamelled Le Creuset (or other) cookware (yet and hopefully never) but I've seen such items at thrift shops. I guess if you let it boil dry, it will melt.

I too use a industrial-grade range with a 15,000 BTU burner but I tend to watch the heat (except for the Lodge cast iron pan that I used for making blackened burgers,fish/chicken/pork chops).

That makes sense. The full-blast sessions my Le Creuset endures are supervised, so the pot never runs dry.

A dutch oven should be cast iron, heavy and cost less than $20. The OP has some sort of yuppified overpriced cooking utensil produced mainly for show and display.

MisterNice

Shucks, if it's aluminum, it's just a soup or stock pot, hardly useful at all for the myriad indoor and outdoor roles of a real "Dutch Oven". I bet the sum..... don' even have no ware handle for hanging and carrying. The kind with legs are hardly ever seen any more, and anything but black cast iron is as out of place as a Hezbollah member at a Bar Mitzva.