Identify our new cast iron skillet

[James86004]

We just bought a cast iron skillet at the thrift store. THe brand is "American Cookware". Anyone every hear of that? It doesn't seem particularly old.

The cooking surface is a lot smoother than on our other cast iron skillets.

 

[HanzoSteel]

Did it look to be pre-seasoned at one time? I'm not sure when the whole pre-season thing started. I got some that are about 40 years old and just bought a Lodge grill skillet.

 

[paulj]

There's a collectors association of Griswold and other cast iron cookware. I think they have a list of very many brands from the past

http://www.gcica.org/index.html

At one time there were many makers of cast iron cookware in the US, some producing no name generic products that could be found on any hardware store shelf. There are probably some numbers on the handle or bottom identifying the size.

The inside surface was often finished, either with sandblasting or machining. Lodge, the remaining US caster, dropped this step some time ago, in part of as cost saving step, and also claiming that it did not make much difference in the cooking properties (once seasoned).

 

[James86004]

Thanks. It is definitely machined. The surface roughness of the unmachined parts is a lot more rough than the surface roughness on our Lodge stuff. It looks like they put it on a sanding wheel the size of the pan. I guess Lodge decided it was cheaper to improve the quality of the casting and not machine it.

It has "7 B" stamped with a hand stamp on the handle.

This was a bad thing - now I will need to look for these in thrift shops all the time.