[Madidus_Scientia (OP)]

Today whilst buying some cookware my friend who was with me said that he'd heard you shouldn't cook with stainless steel utensils because acid in the food reacts with it and effects the taste. I can accept the possibility of acid slightly attacking the steel, but would it really be to the extent as to alter taste? I would have thought it would take much longer than the time it takes to cook a meal for acid that weak to significantly react with steel.

[lightarrow]

It depends what your friend uses instead of stainless steel. If he uses glass or pottery, for example, then I'd say it is certainly (a little) less reactive than stainless steel, with food. This said, I really don't know if cooking with SS can affect the taste, but it's possible. Cooking food can produce a lot of "strange" chemicals, some of which could react with the container forming complexes with iron or nichel or chromium (elements contained in the SS) and so change the taste, in theory.

[Karen W.]

I cook with Stainless steel and with cast iron. I keep my cast well seasoned and after each use season the pan on the stove to retain its seasoning, and once a year I throw them in a big fire to give them a good cook off. It burns off anything on outside and inside to keep them smooth and in nice condition.. Then oil it and season on stove top or in oven again to reseason... My parents grandparents and several generations have done this in preserving their cast iron cookware.

I have never had stainless flavored foods.. the taste is fine and I have never noticed bad or different flavors. Stainless is very perceptible to acidic corrosion, so it is important to remove acid tomato based foods from stainless and store the food in glass or plastic in the fridge.

I stored a big tomato based soup in the pan and it ate a whole through my pan in the fridge after a couple days in side it.

[Madidus_Scientia (OP)]

Tomato soup ate a hole through a stainless steel pan in a few days? In a fridge?! (lower temperature means less reaction)

It must have been a very thin pan?

[geo driver]

well you should never keep food in metal containers, like a half used tin of beens kepet in the fridge ext... i think this has somthing to do with oxidation which can taint the food.  but cooking with stainless why not