Thursday 26 February 2009

Non-stick saucepans

Teflon is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the slipperiest material in the world - so says one of those interesting web sites! http://www.vat19.com/brain-candy/accidental-inventions-teflon.cfm

While the material, discovered by accident by DuPont was being tested, a French engineer, Marc Gregoire, obtained a small amount of Teflon, intending to coat his fishing gear with it. Recognizing a more useful way to employ non-stick, Gregoire's wife asked him to coat her frying pans. The result was so successful that Gregoire patented non-stick cookware in 1954 and set up a factory in 1956.

While simply rinsing a pot this morning after making scrambled eggs I was thinking about the "old days" of aluminium saucepans and brillo pads.... There are many ways in which our lives are so much easier than those of our parents. How they would have enjoyed, and appreciated, the simplicity of just running a little hot water into the pan and it is clean!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Would Brother Laurence, he of 'The Practice of the Presence of God', not have missed out on something had there been Teflon in his time?

Anonymous said...

I was thinking that as I wrote...but then...maybe he'd have had time to do other things as well...