The Ultimate Sauce Pan: Your Kitchen's Best Friend

A saucepan is a versatile piece of cookware that is used for cooking anything involving liquids. It is deep with high sides and straight edges, usually featuring a long handle and a lid. Its surface area is generally small relative to its height, allowing heat to be evenly distributed through the liquid in the pan. It is perfect for boiling water, stewing, simmering, making soups, and making sauces.

Saucepan Uses

A saucepan is a versatile tool that can be used for a variety of cooking tasks. Its distinct shape—deep with high sides and straight edges, a long handle, and a lid—makes it ideal for handling liquids and cooking foods that are mostly liquid. Here are some common uses for a saucepan:

Cooking Liquids and Making Sauces

Saucepans are typically used for cooking anything involving liquids, such as stewing, simmering, and making soups. Their small surface area relative to their height allows for even heat distribution through the liquid, making it perfect for reducing sauces. Whether you're making a tomato sauce, béchamel, velouté, hollandaise, or even a custard-based sauce, a saucepan is a great choice.

Boiling Water and Cooking Pasta

A saucepan is perfect for boiling water, whether it's for a small serving of pasta or for cooking other starchy foods like rice, couscous, quinoa, or mashed potatoes. Its height allows for containing a high volume of liquid in a small area, preventing spillage.

Braising and Sautéing

If your saucepan is oven-safe, you can use it for braising small batches of meat. While a sauté pan is generally a better choice for this task, a saucepan can still get the job done. Due to its shape, a saucepan can also be used for sautéing and stir-frying, although its straight edges may make stirring and scraping a bit more challenging.

Cooking Grains and Legumes

In addition to rice, a saucepan is useful for cooking other grains and legumes that require boiling, such as lentils, risotto, or any other type of grain. The lid that comes with the saucepan aids in the creation of steam, which is essential for cooking these types of foods.

Drawbacks of Using a Saucepan

While saucepans are versatile, they do have some limitations. Their size is one of the main drawbacks, as they are usually smaller than stockpots and may not be suitable for cooking large quantities of food. The shape of a saucepan, with its straight edges and corners, can make stirring and cleaning more difficult. Food may also stick or burn in the corners, so frequent stirring is necessary.

Saucepan Characteristics

Saucepans are a type of pan with a distinct shape. They are deep with high sides and straight edges, usually featuring a long handle and a lid. They are taller than they are wide, with a small surface area relative to their height. This shape allows heat to be evenly distributed through the liquid in the pan, making saucepans perfect for cooking anything involving liquid. This includes boiling water, stewing, simmering, making soups, and, unsurprisingly, making sauces.

Saucepans come in a variety of sizes, though they are usually around 2-3 quarts. They are smaller than stockpots or Dutch ovens but are deeper than frying pans, and taller and narrower than sauté pans. They are also available in a range of materials, including stainless steel, cast iron, copper, and non-stick.

Saucepans are generally meant to be used on the stovetop, though they can also be used in the oven, as long as they are oven-safe. Their height is one of their main selling points, as it allows a high volume of liquid to be contained in a small area, preventing spillage. This makes them ideal for boiling water, as well as cooking pasta, lentils, risotto, mashed potatoes, or any other grain that requires boiling.

Saucepans with a non-stick coating should not be placed in the oven. Additionally, their straight edges can make stirring and scraping difficult, and their shape can make them tough to clean. Despite these drawbacks, saucepans are a versatile and essential tool for any kitchen, whether professional or home.

Saucepan vs Pot

A saucepan is a versatile tool that can be used for a lot of different tasks. It is a pan that can be used to cook sauces, but it can also be used for other tasks, such as boiling water, stewing, simmering, and making soups. Its distinct shape makes it quite versatile. It is deep with high sides and straight edges, and usually features a long handle and a lid. Its surface area is generally small relative to its height, allowing heat to be evenly distributed through the liquid in the pan.

Saucepans are typically used on the stovetop and come in many sizes, though 2-3 quart saucepans are most common. They are smaller than stockpots or Dutch ovens but are deeper than frying pans, and taller and narrower than sauté pans.

A pot, on the other hand, has tall sides and two loop handles. Pots are used for simmering or boiling liquids that completely cover ingredients to cook them from all sides. They are ideal for making large quantities of liquid, such as for soups or stocks.

While saucepans and pots may be used interchangeably for some tasks, their distinct shapes and features make them better suited for different purposes. The high sides and single handle of a saucepan make it ideal for cooking sauces and heating liquids, while the tall sides and two loop handles of a pot make it better for boiling liquids and cooking larger quantities of food.

Saucepan vs Saucier

A saucepan is a versatile tool that can transform the way you cook and prepare your meals. It can be used for simmering sauces, boiling pasta, steaming vegetables, stewing, simmering, making soups, and even braising. It is deep with high sides and straight edges, and usually features a long handle and a lid. Its surface area is generally small relative to its height, allowing heat to be evenly distributed through the liquid in the pan.

A saucier, on the other hand, is the more refined relative of the saucepan. It is similar to a saucepan but has a more superior shape. A saucier is generally shorter and wider, with a rounded bottom and sloped walls. It also has a handle and a lid, like a saucepan. A saucier is ideal for recipes that require frequent stirring, whisking, or tossing, as its rounded shape allows you to reach all areas of the cooking surface with a spoon or whisk.

Both a saucepan and a saucier are ideal for boiling water, making sauces, deep-frying, and braising. However, the main differences lie in their shape, ease of use, versatility, and cooking surface area.

A saucepan has a flat bottom and tall, straight sides, with a narrow opening and a long handle. It looks like a cylinder with a handle attached. The high sides ensure that sauces don't spill over, and the flat bottom maximises contact with the burner. Most saucepans come with lids, which are perfect for cooking rice, steaming vegetables, and simmering sauces. They are also better for boiling pasta and simmering sauces as the smaller opening and high sides help to contain liquids and prevent spillage.

A saucier, on the other hand, has a rounded bottom and edges, with a wide opening and shallow edges. It looks like a bowl with a handle. The sloped sides of a saucier make it easier to whisk and stir, and prevent food from getting stuck along the edges. This makes it ideal for recipes that require constant stirring, such as custard and certain sauces. The wider opening of a saucier also means that it has a faster evaporation rate, which is ideal for reducing sauces quickly.

In terms of ease of use, a saucier is generally considered easier to use than a saucepan as its sloped edges prevent food from getting stuck on the side of the pan. The curved edges also allow for more even cooking, reducing the chance of burning. A saucepan, with its straight sides and flat bottom, can be more difficult to clean as food and burnt bits can get stuck in the bottom edges of the pan.

When it comes to versatility, a saucepan is more limited in terms of size. It has a smaller opening and less cooking surface area, which can make it difficult to cook large quantities of food. A saucier, with its wider opening and larger cooking surface, is more versatile in terms of the quantity of food it can handle.

In summary, both a saucepan and a saucier are useful tools in the kitchen, with some overlapping functions. However, a saucier may be a more convenient option due to its ease of use, versatility, and faster evaporation rate. That being said, a saucepan may be preferred for certain tasks such as boiling pasta or simmering sauces where spillage is a concern.

Saucepan vs Sauce Pot

A saucepan is a versatile piece of cookware that can be used for a wide range of tasks. It is believed that saucepans were first invented in the 17th century and were used solely for making sauces. However, over time, people began to find other uses for them.

Saucepans are characterised by their distinct shape—they are deep, with high sides and straight edges, and usually have a long handle and a lid. Their surface area is generally small relative to their height, allowing heat to be distributed evenly through the liquid in the pan. They are typically used on stovetops but can also be placed in the oven, provided they are oven-safe.

Saucepans are ideal for cooking anything that is mostly liquid. This includes stewing, simmering, making soups, and of course, sauces. Due to their shape, they are also suitable for braising and sautéing. Their size makes them perfect for cooking smaller quantities of food, such as a small serving of pasta, mashed potatoes, risotto, or lentils.

Despite their versatility, saucepans do have some drawbacks. Their limited size means they are not suitable for cooking large quantities of food. Additionally, their shape requires frequent stirring to prevent food from burning or sticking, and they can be challenging to clean due to their sharp corners.

Now, how do saucepans differ from sauce pots? While the terms are sometimes used interchangeably, they are technically different. A sauce pot typically refers to a deep pot with two short handles, whereas a saucepan has one long handle. Sauce pots are usually larger than saucepans, and because of their deeper sides, they are also known as sauce pans or sauciers.

In summary, both saucepans and sauce pots are excellent for cooking liquids and making sauces, but their differences lie in their size and handle design.

Frequently asked questions