Making antique French copper pan useful in a modern kitchen with the traditional hand-tinning method
Wiped tin is the traditional lining for copper cookware because it provides a naturally anti-stick, nonreactive, nontoxic cooking surface that typically holds up to a couple decades or more of regular cooking before it needs retinning again. The pan can be restored more or less eternally this way, making tinned copper the longest-lasting, most sustainable style of cookware.
Quality French copper pans are pricey, but they can permanently replace your nonstick-coated cookware; and the lifetime cost of ownership with retinning every 2-3 decades can easily be lower than replacing most "ceramic" nonstick pans when the coating fails every couple years, or premium Teflon coated pans when they fail every 3-5 years. Copper pans will never end up in a landfill like nonstick coated ones inevitably do.
A splayed saute/Windsor like the antique piece in the video is a dual-purpose pan: (1) sauteing, where the angled sidewalls both make for easier stirring and, with copper's remarkably even heat distribution, allow chunks of food resting on the sides to cook at the same rate as the ones on the bottom. (2) reducing sauces, stocks and other liquids, where the conical shape provides a relatively constant ratio of surface area to liquid volume. This yields a more constant/predictable rate of reduction than a straight or curved walled pot, and the narrow base prevents the issue of a small volume of sauce getting away from the cook and scorching or overreducing too quickly.
This one has a silky patina from a long commercial cooking career in France. The leading corner is compressed from many decades of chefs repeatedly banging it on a flat top to jump-saute, common wear on old restaurant pots. Between that and the thousands of nicks and scratches from dragging on the plaque, the patina gives the copper a soft feel and conveys a rich cooking history in hand.
To shop restored vintage and antique high-end French copper cookware, or get your old copper pan put back in working order:
https://northcoastcopper.etsy.com
For more info on using and restoring traditional copper cookware, or to contact me with any questions:
/ northcoastcopper
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