Do You and Should You Test Your Vintage Cast Iron For Lead?

What do you think? Do you test your cast iron finds for lead? Is contamination something to worry about or not worth your time?

Does cast iron itself contain lead? No - proper pure cast iron should not have any lead introduced in the manufacturing process. But sometimes people use cast iron to melt lead which can contaminate the iron in which case the pan should never be used for cooking food. Be on the lookout for signs of lead and consider testing used and vintage cast iron if you don't know its full history.

Here is the EPA page on lead testing and lead in general:

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[turdferguson]

It's been my experience that a lot of gate mark camp ovens, small skillets and very old pieces are more likely to have been contaminated than larger size kitchen skillets. I use the same type of test kit and it does seem to work. I don't test every piece in the collection because I shouldn't be using them but I would test anything I planned to use.

[CookieTaylor-ji]

The kits I’m finding on Amazon all dip in water. I really want the one you are using. Just bought some vintage cast iron.

[JesseSkwierawski]

The 3M ones are nearly useless. I got the 2 stick kit from Amazon to test my house for lead paint. They run out of liquid so fast that you aren't even sure if you tested anything. Then I couldn't tell if it changed color or was just wet. These seem to give you way more test swabs and a much larger time window for testing. Interesting results on the pans and various items.

[BrianMcKee]

You should strip the pan seasoning completely off before testing since you need direct contact with the pan to test. Also these tests can give false positives in the presence of Zinc. It is also important to know that these tests are nowhere near sensitive enough to detect medically significant but small amounts of lead, however they should be fine in detecting if a pan was used to melt lead due to the large amounts involved.

[michaelhayes]

I have an small cast iron pan i melt lead in it but i got a cheap one at Walmart

[BL-rbjm]

I personally unless I know the history will never buy. Used pots and pans, no matter what because I had a neighbor that was cooking crystal math and and then then those are the ones that could be. Sent to a second hand store and nobody would be any wiser

[BL-rbjm]

A man should not use a cast iron.Frying pan he's better off with a stainless steel frying pan that perhaps comes from india. The reason is that he's not like a woman that needs iron every month. I know this may sound crazy. But it has been linked to heart attacks for men and I personally know of someone who used to cast ir in frying PAN. And that's what he happened to suffer from is a massive heart attack. He had one and then he had another 1 and then the other 1 he was dead. Do your research but perhaps things have changed

[fv]

We were raised around lead based paints, and are all still healthy.😊