Choosing
An egg sticks to almost anything and it cooks fast enough that a slow pan ruins it. That makes it the honest test of a frying pan: a pan that does eggs well does everything else too. Shape matters as much as surface — a flat pan with low sides lets a spatula underneath, and a deep one does not.
Eggs are the test. Here is what passes it.
A flat pan with low sloping sides. The Russell Hobbs 25 cm is cast aluminium with a stated PFOA-free nonstick and describes itself as a flat omelette shape — that geometry is what lets a spatula get underneath from any angle.
The Blackmoor 28 cm ceramic nonstick, stated PFAS-free, induction compatible, hand wash only. The hand-wash instruction is the price of the ceramic surface; ignore it and the pan stops releasing early.
The de Buyer 24 cm in uncoated carbon steel, beeswax-protected, with a riveted angled handle. Carbon steel is seasoned like cast iron and much lighter. Wash the beeswax off before the first use, season it, and it becomes the best egg pan here — after a month, not on the first day.
The Zuofeng 28 cm, granite-effect nonstick on cast aluminium with a magnetised base, dishwasher safe.
The Fackelmann 25 cm in recycled aluminium with a stated PFAS-free ceramic coating and a Bakelite handle rated to 150 °C. That handle rating tells you plainly it does not go in the oven — which is more useful than an unqualified “oven safe”.
Medium heat and enough fat. An egg on a screaming pan sticks in any surface, coated or not.
28 cm · ceramic nonstick · PFAS-free surface stated · induction · hand wash only
The cheapest pan in this hub and the one with the clearest instructions: Blackmoor states a ceramic, PFAS-free cooking surface and an aluminium body, and states plainly that the pan is neither dishwasher nor oven safe.
Best for: A first pan, a student kitchen, or a spare that will be replaced without regret.
≈ £16 / 19 €
28 cm · granite-effect nonstick · cast aluminium · magnetised base · dishwasher safe
A granite-effect coated cast aluminium pan with a magnetised base for induction. The maker states the coating is free of PFOA, lead and cadmium, and that the pan is dishwasher safe.
Best for: Someone who wants a coated pan that can go in the dishwasher without an argument.
≈ £23 / 23 €
Because the shape is right. Low sloping sides let a spatula slide underneath from any direction; a deep frying pan makes you approach from one side and tear the egg. The Russell Hobbs here is described as a flat omelette shape for exactly that reason.
Twenty-five to twenty-six centimetres for two or three eggs. Larger and the egg spreads too thin; smaller and an omelette gets thick and slow.
Once it is seasoned, extremely well — it is what French kitchens use. Before it is seasoned, it will stick to everything. The de Buyer here arrives beeswax-protected, which must be washed off before first use.
Cookware sets, knife blocks and cast iron swing by thirty euros or more across the year, and the biggest "discounts" often land at prices the same model sold for six weeks earlier. UniverTrack tracks the real price history across retailers, spots fake reductions, and alerts you when it is genuinely the moment to buy.
