The Cast-Iron Skillet

I’ve been at this for a while, and, not surprisingly, I own an array of great cast-iron cooking surfaces and pans. But the one I treasure most is my grandfather’s 10-inch (25-cm) cast-iron skillet. The pan is almost a hundred years old, has been owned by my family since day one, and has seen some serious Southern cooking, thanks to its South Carolina heritage. My grandfather passed it on to my mother when she was twenty and starting a family on Long Island, and my mother passed it on to me when I moved to New York City at age twenty-one. That skillet has been in appreciative hands since the beginning.