Cooking Pans and Pots
Since the Stone Age, people have cooked food. Mostly they have cooked food over an open fire. That is the equivalent of roasting. But since people learned to make pots from clay, they have also been able to cook food by boiling and stewing.
As soon as iron was used, pots became mainly made of iron. They were often very large, and we know them as cauldrons. The reason they were very large is because food was normally cooked for communities - large families for example. Most food was also not the high quality e expect today. It was tough and needed a very long cooking time.
The majority of food was actually boiled. Boiled food in a cauldron over an open fire was known as pottage and was a mixture of pieces of meat and vegetable.
But different parts of the world had different kinds of fuel. In wooded area they could use wood, but in areas short of wood, people had to use grass or dried animal dung. And where fuel was short, rapid cooking containers were developed, such as a wok.
Today, People use different containers for cooking different kinds of food.
A frying pan (sometimes called a skillet or padella) has a wide flat base and is used for frying foods such as eggs, bacon and pancakes.
A wok is a deep bowl-shaped pan used especially in Asian cooking. Its shape helps food cook quickly while being stirred.
A saucepan is deeper and usually has high sides. It is used for heating liquids, making sauces, soups and vegetables.
A casserole dish is a deep cooking dish used for slow cooking. Food can be cooked gently for a long time in an oven.
A stockpot is a large deep pot used for making soups, stews and stocks.
Cooking pans are made from different materials such as iron, steel, aluminium, copper and ceramic. Different materials spread heat in different ways.
People choose different pans because different foods need different methods of cooking.
