Aluminum cookware?

o&itw · #1 04/27/12, 04:34 PM

After oxygen and silicon, aluminum is the most plentiful element on the surface of the earth. A person breathes in about 60 lbs of air a day, and along with that billions upon billions of particles. I could not find an average amount by weight for dirt particles, but what I did find is that much of it is caught by the mouth and throat and eventually swallowed. Now I am not saying that aluminum is good for anyone to ingest, but since about 8% of the non-organic dust a person breathes everyday is aluminum, is the extremely small amount that leaches out of dishes significant? Especially when aluminum is only soluble in water in a (basic) non-acid solution. Most of our food and drinks are a least slightly acid.

Harry Chickpea · #2 04/27/12, 05:40 PM

Very mildly significant, IMO, but aluminum is etched by acids. Stick your tomato sauce in an aluminum pot overnight and you'll realize that.

One way of looking at aluminum is that once oxidized it is WAY down in the pit as far as reactivity. It takes a tremendous amount of electrical energy to bring the aluminum out of bauxite or alumina. More highly reactive stuff (with the infamous "free radicals" in that group) are more likely to create changes.

o&itw · #3 04/30/12, 04:43 PM

Oops... I stand corrected aluminum is slightly reactive with acid, but in an acid solution it is only about 3 ppm... still I think much less than one breathes in outside air in a couple of hours.

Sodium hydroxide, however will eat through aluminum in no time as people during the 40's found when the factories tried to replace the large iron cook kettles with aluminum ones. Soap making didn't work to well.... especially when the bottom fell out of the kettle

Harry Chickpea · #4 04/30/12, 06:00 PM

"Soap making didn't work to well.... especially when the bottom fell out of the kettle "

Yeah, that could be a problem!

TxMex · #5 04/30/12, 06:58 PM

I used aluminum cookware heavily when my children were little. Testing showed toxic levels of aluminum in my sons system. When I received the results I threw out every aluminum pan I owned. I only use stainless steel and cast iron now. Aluminum is especially damaging for the brain. Why take the chance?!

Raven12 · #6 04/30/12, 08:10 PM

After cooking with cast iron, I don't think I can go back.

dfr1973 · #7 04/30/12, 08:17 PM

My opinion on aluminum cookware: It is inferior to copper-bottom stainless steel and cast iron. Even if you aren't worried about health effects, why get something that is noticeably second-rate?

(I had this conversation with hubby about a camp kit.)

Laura Zone 10 · #8 05/01/12, 06:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TxMex

I used aluminum cookware heavily when my children were little. Testing showed toxic levels of aluminum in my sons system. When I received the results I threw out every aluminum pan I owned. I only use stainless steel and cast iron now. Aluminum is especially damaging for the brain. Why take the chance?!

Double ditto

springvalley · #9 05/01/12, 06:36 AM

I also have heard that it could have a conection with allzhimers (sp), to much in your system is not good for you, I will take SS anyday. > Thanks Marc

foxtrapper · #10 05/01/12, 07:49 AM

8% of the non-organic content of dust is aluminum oxide eh? I'd like to see the source of that claim. It's not one I've ever seen regarding dust and toxicology.

Aluminum is associated with pneumoconiosis, neurotoxicity and several other less than pleasant effects.

It also tastes funny and is easily leached into foods, imparting that taste to them.

I chose to avoid it as a cooking utensil for those reasons.

wildcat6 · #11 05/01/12, 08:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dfr1973

My opinion on aluminum cookware: It is inferior to copper-bottom stainless steel and cast iron. Even if you aren't worried about health effects, why get something that is noticeably second-rate?

(I had this conversation with hubby about a camp kit.)

Out of curiousity which camp kit did you all decide to go with or which do you use? I have been looking for a a few days and am having a hard time deciding. I was leaning away from aluminum but for very different reasons than health and now we have the health considerations to consider.

dfr1973 · #12 05/01/12, 09:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wildcat6

Out of curiousity which camp kit did you all decide to go with or which do you use? I have been looking for a a few days and am having a hard time deciding. I was leaning away from aluminum but for very different reasons than health and now we have the health considerations to consider.

We still haven't decided yet ... a couple other things on our list came up that we've diverted to for this month's allocation. I personally lean towards finding an older (stainless) mess kit from decades ago - back when product quality still meant something. Hubby has been looking at the individual camp mess kits, not family-sized, and had considered aluminum due to weight. I told him it would be cheaper to cut apart pop cans! IMO not much difference in quality, but I recall the camp kits from 30+ years ago when I was a Girl Scout and several troopmates had their older siblings', parents' or uncles' older hand-me-down camp kits that weren't even dented.

What we currently have right now is cast iron

wildcat6 · #13 05/01/12, 09:47 AM

When I was a scout we used the open country mess kits. They are aluminum but were heavier than those of today and the were made in the USA. Even though they were aluminum they were pretty good and I would like to find some but from what I understand even the new ones from that line are now made in China with inferior materials.

o&itw · #14 05/01/12, 04:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by foxtrapper

8% of the non-organic content of dust is aluminum oxide eh? I'd like to see the source of that claim. It's not one I've ever seen regarding dust and toxicology.

Aluminum is associated with pneumoconiosis, neurotoxicity and several other less than pleasant effects.

It also tastes funny and is easily leached into foods, imparting that taste to them.

I chose to avoid it as a cooking utensil for those reasons.

I won't contest the rest of your post... I don't know, but if you doubt the 8% (I didn't say aluminum oxide, just aluminum [in some form]) just Google.

I already have (heavy aluminum) cookware..as well as some stainless, and cast iron. Again, I am not saying that aluminum isn't toxic to some extent, just that the amount one pics up from normal breathing is likely to be exceedingly more, and if so, is worrying about the marginal amount in cookware reasonable. There are so may less than desirable chemicals floating around in the air any more, one can't get away from them (take dioxin for instance which is extremely toxic). This is a simply a question of relativity,

foxtrapper · #15 05/02/12, 05:15 AM

Ah, ok. You've no basis in other words.

I work in air pollution and toxicology myself, that's why I found the 8% so fascinating, as I've never seen it, and couldn't find anything to support it.

Certainly aluminum is not the most exciting chemical out there. There are others far more dangerous. Which is irrelivent. The argument you are placing forth is akin to saying that a .22 is a puny thing compared to a .45, and therefore one should be less concerned about handling it carelessly.

If a person is worried about aluminum, and therefore doesn't want to use deodorants becuase of it, fine. Just as another person may love the stuff and make protective hats from it. Again, fine. It is a personal choice. As it is your choice to decide it's not worth worrying about at all. Myself, I just mostly don't like the taste it tends to impart into my food when it's cooked in or on aluminum.

Cliff · #16 05/02/12, 09:02 AM

There are exposures and risks we can do nothing about and there are those we can prevent. Do whatever seems most prudent.

ronbre · #17 05/02/12, 09:45 AM

aluminum has been found in overly high amounts in the brains of autopsied alzheimer victims

RedDirt Cowgirl · #18 05/02/12, 01:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by springvalley

I also have heard that it could have a conection with allzhimers (sp), to much in your system is not good for you, I will take SS anyday. > Thanks Marc

All my mother's relatives cooked in beautiful aluminum utensils, and there's a heavy rate of dementia in those households. A fabulous set in our old ranch house with heavy glass lids was tough to get rid of, but I think you'ld be better off not using it in any way. Used a kettle to make a huge batch of blackberry jam in my kid days and it tasted metalic, thank god I threw the stuff out.

I also observed the changes using foil to line oven barbequed chicken wings (my favorite, charred) - even "lids" of foil change too. That's enough for me I, regardless of tests and statistics.

SteveD(TX) · #19 05/02/12, 03:16 PM

I remember when Club Aluminum was some of the best cookware you could buy. And if you were a "purest", you bought only the aluminum clad pans, never the ones coated with evil Teflon.

calliemoonbeam · #20 05/02/12, 07:58 PM

My mother swore by her Club Aluminum, which she got in her 50s...she developed Alzheimer's in her 70s, the only one out of 13 siblings. None of the rest of them cooked with alumin, none had Alzheimer's, and they all lived into their late 80s and 90s. Her autopsy showed a very high concentration of aluminum.

That's good enough for me, plus I saw how tomato products etched into the pans and tasted that metallic taste. I only ate out of those pans for a couple of years before I left home and just hope I got away from it soon enough.

I've always used stainless steel, cast iron or Pyrex type dishes. Now I've developed hemochromatosis (too much iron in the system) and have to give up my cast iron, at least for a while until we see how it does, wahhh!