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Cast Aluminum Pot Degredation

April 27, 2011

I have this ancient pot which was given to me, used, 20 years ago by an eighty-year old cousin. It is my favorite thing to cook in. I didn't know what kind of metal it was, nor had it ever mattered to me until recently, the pot has seemed to be performing differently than it has all these years. So I wondered if I should get a new one. The only thing I had to go on was that it is an olive-greenish color on the outside, and has a clover with the word "CLUB" on the bottom. I searched online and found out that they are called "cast aluminum" and were sold a few decades ago but are no longer available. Sigh.

In addition to everything else I cook in it, I make toffee. Really great English toffee! I use this pot, and I swear it's the secret to my success as I have never burned a batch. But the past couple months it has started to scorch around the center of the pot. The first time it happened, I scrubbed off the scorch, and kept using it, but it has happened every time since. So I started to feel the bottom of the pot and it seems like it MAY be just a slight-bit thinner in the center than it once was. And then while cleaning it recently with a green scrubber pad, the soap turned all gray, and the more I scrubbed, the grayer it got.

So I'm wondering what this is. Could it have broken down and be un-fixable now? I have read a LOT of web pages about the matter, and this web page is the most rational, informative page I've found, but after reading all the comments I'm still wondering if there is anything I can do with this pot to make it stop giving off gray substance and scorching my food? Can cast aluminum pots stop working properly? If so, do any of you have any recommendations about an equivalent pot I could buy today.

I really love this pot. I'm not worried about diseases from aluminum cookware. I just really love the weight and performance of this pot and am sad to see it not working the way it has the past 20 years for me. Suggestions? Any help about the matter is appreciated. I'm not going to get all Princess Leah on you and say you're my only hope, but you DO seem to be the most knowledgeable person I've found on the matter. I sincerely appreciate your insight and time.
Best,
Blue
PS: I'm happy to make you some toffee in thanks for your help! Just include the place I should send it in your reply :-)

Blue Jeuls
Toffee Maker, Really Nice Person - Salt Lake City, Utah, USA

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April 29, 2011

Hi, Princess.

Aluminum is a great conductor of heat, and the heavier the better, so I can believe that the pot contributes to your success. You may be able to find vintage Club cookware on eBay .

I doubt that you will find anything as good today because none of today's CEOs seems to have the integrity to resist "meatball whoring" (taking a logo/meatball that had earned a reputation for quality, then trying to maximize profit by selling that logo/meatball off to be misleadingly placed onto cheaper products). But go to a department and feel the weight of the cast aluminum cookware and see if anything feels as heavy.

I think it would be worthwhile to try to steep warm diluted (say one cup per gallon) vinegar [in bulk on eBay or Amazon] in the pot for a couple of hours, then rinse; then neutralize by steeping baking soda [on eBay or Amazon] (say one box per pot) for a couple of hours. Do a final scrub with damp baking soda and paper towels. It may stop the gray dusting. If it doesn't, probably nothing food-safe will.

Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey