13 Easy Cast Iron Skillet Dessert Recipes (2024)

FAQs

What can you bake in a cast iron skillet? ›

Bake what you want, any way you want

Bonus: It can be used for so much more than dessert, like pizza, rolls, roasted foods, and quiches. Want a crispy crust? Preheat your cast iron bakeware before adding your batter or dough for crunchy edges on cornbread, pizza, and biscuits.

Grease the Pan

We recommend using a baking spray that contains flour to grease the pan before baking. If you don't have a cooking spray, you can also use a tablespoon of room temperature butter to coat the pan. It's not necessary to preheat the pan in the oven before adding the batter, but it won't hurt either.

This chocolate cake topped with milk chocolate frosting couldn't be easier—it's made, and baked, right in a cast iron skillet. Stella Parks is a CIA-trained baking nerd and pastry wizard, dubbed one of America's Best New Pastry Chefs by Food & Wine. She was the pastry editor at Serious Eats from 2016 to 2019.

Is There Anything You Shouldn't Cook in Your Cast-Iron Skillet? Experts Weigh In. While there's nothing that's technically off limits, the pros say you should be careful with acidic foods, like tomato or wine sauce, which can corrode the seasoning if left in the pan for too long.

Yes, you can season the pans for frying, sautéing, or baking in cast iron cookware like pans, pots, or skillets with butter, but it's not the right choice to season it for the first time. Butter immediately starts to smoke when added to a heated pan because cast iron can withstand a lot of heat.

But despite some popular cooking myths, cast iron does not heat evenly—or quickly. That's why preheating is such an important (and often overlooked) step.

You should season a cast-iron skillet at least once a month, but seasoning it after each time you cook with it also works. You may not need to repeat the entire seasoning process as you did before initially using it, but after each use, rinse it and give your cast-iron skillet a quick season by oiling it.

Place the cookware in the oven upside down. Place a large baking sheet or aluminum foil on the bottom rack. Bake at 450-500 degrees F for one hour.

When selecting a seasoning oil, you want one that's high in polyunsaturated fats and has a high ratio of polyunsaturated fat to monounsaturated fat. Among common cooking oils, grapeseed oil and sunflower oil stand out for their high polyunsaturated fat content and desirable ratio of polyunsaturated to saturated fat.

What temperature should I bake my cast iron skillet? ›

To begin seasoning your cast iron skillet, place a sheet of heavy-duty aluminum foil on the bottom of your oven, or a baking sheet covered in aluminum foil on the lowest rack. Preheat the oven to 400°F. Wash your skillet with soap and water, then dry it off completely with a soft cloth or paper towel.

We recommend starting with vegetables as they are more forgiving than most proteins - they taste delicious and won't stick to your pan! Keep in mind that using a little bit of oil is necessary to help to keep food from sticking.

As you are using high heat cooking methods, you'll want to employ high heat cooking oils, like coconut, grapeseed, vegetable (controversial for some, but bears a high smoke point) or lard. Cast iron skillet cooking lends itself PERFECTLY to shallow or deep frying because it conducts heats so well.

Not only can you cook eggs many ways in cast iron, you should: the material's superior heat retention and (especially in baking) heat distribution means better eggs—softer scrambles, crispier fried edges, and fluffier frittatas and stratas—no matter how you cook them.

Prior to cooking, add about a teaspoon of oil to your skillet and heat it gradually on the stovetop or in the oven to help reduce sticking. After cooking, allow the cookware to cool, then use a pan scraper to remove stuck-on food, scrub with a nylon brush or nonscratch pad, hand dry, and add a generous layer of oil.

The quality of absorbing heat and holding onto it makes cast iron ideal for any recipe that starts on the stove and ends in the oven. From searing a thick steak or spatchco*cked chicken that finishes in the oven to caramelizing apples for a tarte tatin, cast iron is the best possible choice for this kind of cooking.

Wash the skillet with warm soapy water. Dry it thoroughly with a lint-free cloth or paper towel. Apply a thin layer of cooking oil to the surface of your cookware (inside and out, including the handles). Bake your cookware upside down at 450 degrees Fahrenheit in the oven for one hour.

Polymerization: The science of cast iron seasoning

Without this layer of carbonized oil, iron cookware would corrode and rust due to the oxygen and moisture in the air. On a microscopic level, cast iron has a jagged, uneven surface.