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Cast-iron skillets are great<\/a>. They last forever, cook pretty evenly, offer an all-natural form of non-stickiness, add a nice crust to everything from pizzas to cookies<\/a>, are clutch in frying chicken<\/a>, and make you feel like a cowboy out on the open range when you\u2019re searing a steak<\/a>.<\/p>\n But, they\u2019re certainly not without their inconveniences. They\u2019re heavy as heck, not as non-stick as more modern cookware, will rust if not kept thoroughly dry, and should be re-oiled after washing.<\/p>\n And, most annoyingly of all, cleaning a cast-iron skillet can be a pain because one of the, ahem, iron-clad laws of using this kind of cookware is that YOU NEVER USE SOAP ON A CAST-IRON SKILLET!<\/p>\n The reason given for this rule is that if you were to use soap, it would strip the cast iron of its \u201cseasoning.\u201d<\/p>\n Seasoning is a layer of polymerized oil that\u2019s baked into all cast-iron cookware. It\u2019s what gives a cast-iron skillet a non-stick (really more like an \u201ceasy-release\u201d) surface. The more you cook with your cast-iron skillet, the more this layer of polymerized oil builds up, and the more its easy-release properties are enhanced. People pass cast-iron skillets from one generation to the next, with patinas of oil decades in the making along with them.<\/p>\n Not wanting to strip my cast-iron skillet of its precious seasoning, I never used soap to clean it \u2014 just water and elbow grease.<\/p>\n And for the most part, that\u2019s all I\u2019ve needed to clean my cast iron. Thanks to its seasonsing, cleaning a cast-iron skillet has usually been fairly easy.<\/p>\n But, I\u2019ve had instances of cleaning my cast-iron skillet where I\u2019ve faced some really baked-on detritus that would have easily been eliminated by adding a bit of soap to my scrubbing. But, of course . . .<\/p>\n YOU NEVER USE SOAP ON A CAST-IRON SKILLET!<\/p>\n So I just scrubbed harder with straight water, and sometimes a layer of friction-generating salt, to get that stuff off.<\/p>\n A few months ago, however, I was once again scrubbing a bit of really baked-on food gunk from my skillet when the thought came to me, \u201cCan you really not use soap on a cast-iron skillet, or is that some bit of oft-repeated-but-inaccurate folklore?\u201d<\/p>\n So I googled it.<\/p>\n Come to find, you CAN use soap on your cast-iron skillet. It will not ruin or strip off its seasoning.<\/p>\n Lodge Cast Iron<\/a> says you can.<\/p>\n Field Company Cast Iron<\/a> says you can.<\/p>\n Serious Eats<\/a> says you can.<\/p>\n America\u2019s Test Kitchen<\/a> says you can.<\/p>\n The list goes on and on.<\/p>\n