An all-in-one pan deserves a place in any hardworking kitchen, but is it worth splashing out on one or can more affordable lookalikes get the job done for a fraction of the price?
That’s the premise that led me to put Our Place’s bestselling Always Pan, which I think is one of the best non-stick cookware on the market head-to-head with IKEA’s strikingly similar KLIPPFISK sauté pan.
Both of these pans have a deep, wide shape that lends them to versatility for home cooks – you can shallow fry, steam, sauté, boil and so much more in a pan of this design. But one was a clear winner in terms of performance in our tests – which adds up given the £86 price difference between the two.
Article continues below
IKEA
Klippfisk Sauté Pan
Deeper than the Always Pan (and a lot cheaper), this IKEA pan is made from cast aluminium and comes as part of the brand’s wider KLIPPFISK cookware range.
This ceramic pan is probably best-known for its pastel colour range, but its also handily oven safe and compatible with a range of accessories, including poachers and steamers.
The basics
Side-by-side, it’s easy see the gulf in quality between the KIPPFLISK and the Always Pan.
The KLIPPFISK is thinner and lighter, lacking the sturdiness that the Always Pan has in your hand and on the hob. IKEA’s version is also a lot deeper, which will suit some for batch cooking, and features a see-through lid, which is always good for keeping an eye on things.
Image 1 of 2
But if you like the idea of popping one of these pans in the oven to finish something off under the grill, then only one of them fits that bill: the Always Pan 2.0. IKEA’S alternative is not suitable for oven use at all. Here’s a full breakdown of the specs.
| Row 0 – Cell 0 |
KLIPPFISK |
Always Pan |
|
Size (diameter) |
28cm |
26.7cm |
|
Capacity |
4.25L |
2.4L |
|
Weight |
1.01kg |
1.36kg |
If you’re buying an all-in-one pan to keep out on your worktop, design is also going to matter here. I think Our Place’s version is much easier on the eye, as well as having the bonus of seven possible colour options. The KLIPPFISK is grey-turquoise as standard and the wood accents might not be for everyone.
Winner: Our Place’s Always Pan 2.0
Cooking tests
The first test on my agenda was a fried egg, which is a good way to see how evenly and quickly heat is distributed across the bottom of a pan.
It felt, with a palm across the base of each, that the IKEA pan was slower to warm than the Our Place one. I went ahead and cracked eggs into each and found that the Always Pan made the kind of ‘sizzle’ sound that you might expect, while the KLIPPFISK took a minute to catch up to the same heat.
The running of the white in the KLIPPFISK across the base of the pan also wasn’t a great sign for me, confirming my suspicions about the temperature of it compared to the Always Pan. The uniformity of the Always Pan eggs says to me that the heat transfer is a lot better.
Next up, I tried bacon. One benefit of the shape of the KLIPPFISK for bacon is that any grease splatters are more contained within the deep shape. It’s also a little roomier.
Image 1 of 2
By the end of the cooking time, I found that the rashers in the IKEA pan had shrivelled a little (as you can see in the photos), which might be an indication that the distribution across the pan isn’t the best.
But other than that, the resutls were fairly similar – I think due to the fact that pans were warmed a little more by this point.
The final run out for these pans was warming up leftovers for lunch. I hoped this would give me even more insight into the evenness of heat. Once again, Our Place’s pan took less time to get to the level of heat I needed compared to IKEA’s, but the KLIPPFISK did catch up after not too long.
Looking at each performance as a whole, the KLIPPFISK did take longer to get there, but once it was up to heat it was fine for non-stick cooking tasks though not as impressive as the Always Pan. Our Place’s version was better in terms of quick start-up times and overall yielded better results. For me, there’s an obvious winner.
Winner: Our Place’s Always Pan 2.0
The winner
There’s been a huge shift away from non-stick pans recently with people opting for non-toxic stainless steel cookware on the main. Our expert reviewer recently tried two fantastic examples, Le Creuset’s stainless steel set and Made In’s version.
But a good non-stick pan is still a great tool to have in your arsenal for quick cooking jobs or if you don’t want to go through the learning curve of getting used to stainless steel. If that sounds like you, I think a versatile all-in-one pan with this kind of deep shape is your best bet.
Our Place’s Always Pan 2.0 is ceramic and non-toxic and though it’s pricey, I think it earns its RRP with the results of this test. If you want better quality, you need to pay a bit more. This pan is a solid all-rounder but its Titanium counterpart remains my favourite of all time if you really want the best of the best.
IKEA’S KLIPPFISK is a fine budget version of the same type of pan, but it doesn’t have the same quality feel or yield the same results. But the £39 price tag is hard to argue with if you’re in desperate need of a stopgap piece of cookware.
The conclusion of my tests then, is what you might expect: when it comes to these two pans, you definitely get what you pay for.
Read the full article here