I’ve been noticing, and occasionally reading, articles about the health benefits of cooking without oil. Cooking oil is a processed food, high in omega-6 fatty acids. The typical American diet already contains too much omega-6 so why add more? Oil is also high in calories, more than double the calories in maple syrup. And most oils are processed using heat and chemical solvents which negatively impact the oil’s taste and nutritional value.
I like to fry eggs in butter. It doesn’t require a lot of butter. It takes only a thin coating to lubricate the pan and prevent sticking. I wondered if it was even possible to fry an egg without some kind of fat in the pan. I had a feeling it wasn’t, but a feeling is not definitive. I decided to experiment.
I put my 10 inch non-stick pan on the stovetop and set the burner element to medium. I allowed the pan to heat up, then cracked two eggs into the pan. I waited until the egg whites had set and then attempted to slip my plastic spatula under one of the eggs to flip it over.
It was like the egg was glued down with epoxy. The spatula hit the edge of the egg white and stopped. No matter how much force I applied to the spatula, I was never going to get it under that egg. I ended up scraping the two semi-fried eggs off the pan and scrambling them. The eggs were quite tasty. But the frying pan’s non-stick coating was left with two fried-egg-shaped blemishes which, even after soaking and scrubbing, refused to completely disappear.
I suppose it’s possible that a brand-new nonstick pan that had never been used for cooking might have fared better, but that’s an experiment for someone else to try. I’ll be using butter.
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