Life after Teflon - comparing cooking pans

In Wednesday's NY Times dining section, Harold McGee revisited a question that all cooks wonder; what's with all these different pan materials - what are they, will they seep into my food or support my efforts at turning out tasty healthy dishes?

The piece kept me reading because McGee ponders the recipe for successful pan sautes and skillet frying. The combination of type of pan, quality and type of oil, quality and type of heat and skill of the chef are interdependent variables to just how a product turns out, so yes, it's complicated.

I cook on top of the stove every day and have an old set of cast iron pans. Some call it nature's Teflon, and that's how they feel to me - easy to care for, well seasoned, reliable, and indestructible. I make everything from eggs to rice to soup to oven roast chicken in them. McGee found cast iron an uneven heat conductor, so in his testing he ended up with a charred ring at the bottom of the pan. If I'm cooking at high heat for very long, I do turn the pan to even heating which makes me think that he's right. I've never, however, had the charred bottom that flummoxed Mr. McGee.

When you're shopping for pans, experts will tell you go for the best pans that you can afford. And it does seem (with the possible exception of cast iron, which tends to be inexpensive) that quality and price rise together. But Mr. McGee is right  in that the pan is just one element of the dish, and exquisite meals have been turned out from the cheapest of pans.

If you're in the fortunate position to be cookware shopping, Real Simple magazine's decent review of pans from its June 2007 issue may be helpful.  Right after the bad news about Teflon's high degree of chemical seepage into food, food writer extraordinaire Marian Burros wrote a nice piece on non stick pans to use instead. For your consideration.

 I'm curious to hear the cookware people use with pros and cons. Happy healthy cooking.