Roasting Pans

Dorie Greenspan, who writes Bon Appétit magazine's "Tools of the Trade" column, says when it comes to roasting pans four characteristics define quality: the pan's weight, its size, the good grip of its handles, and the metal it's made of.

Fine pans are heavy expect them to weigh in the neighborhood of 9 pounds and there's reasons for such heft: a heavy pan allows stove-top searing to promote browning of food before additional cooking time in the oven. And those crusty bits that form on the bottom of the pan are pure gold when it comes to making a pan sauce. Heavy pans are safer. Avoid those flimsy, aluminum foil roasters from the supermarket. They're downright dangerous.

Before you invest in a quality roaster, determine how big a pan your oven can accommodate. Roasters need one to two inches of air space on all sides. If your oven can handle a pan about 16 inches long and 13 inches wide this is the size to consider. It will accommodate turkeys as well as chickens, which roast best when taking up only about half the pan's floor space.

Handles that allow a good grip are obvious for safety reasons. Look for heavy-duty, upright handles riveted to the body of the pan with enough room for hands protected by big mitts to get a good grasp on the pan.

Look for a roaster with an interior of nonreactive metal for those times when you want to cook acidic foods such as tomatoes along with your roast or deglaze the pan with wine. Acidic ingredients can cause aluminum pans to turn gray, giving an unattractive appearance and off taste to the food. The best nonreactive metals for roasters are stainless steel, anodized aluminum, or enameled steel.