Should your cooking include a silver lining (BacoFoil Release Non-Stick foil)

Member Name: sandra101

Product:	BacoFoil Release Non-Stick foil
Date:	12/02/09 (422 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: non-stick, easy washing up

Disadvantages: What have they used to make it work so well - is it 100% safe

Having read a review of this new product and realising the fact that it can save on washing up I couldn't wait to try it. I have a number of non-stick dishes at home but I do find that after a certain amount of use they lose their non-stickability. Even at the beginning of their life I find that some items can easily stick. This particularly happens when you cook like me as I like to make 100% sure that everything is cooked through meaning that all food gets put a little above the recipe temperature and gets an extra 5 minutes.

I was shopping at Tesco for some normal foil when I seen this newer version beside it and remembered the review and although slightly dearer than normal foil £1.15 still seemed pretty reasonable for a five metre roll of foil.

The foil comes in the normal cardboard housing with the jagged edge for cutting the correct length. Once unrolled you notice that the foil is very shiny on one side while dull on the other. The dull side has non-stick written on it so you know which way round to place it whether you are cooking with it or using it as you would normal tinfoil. The foil was reasonably robust and easily moulded to the baking trays I use and I felt it would work better than some of the cheaper alternatives which tear really easily.

I first experimented with covering a large baking sheet with the foil and adding wedges of potato drizzled in oil with a few sprigs of parsley thrown on top. They cooked beautifully and as I lifted the tray from the oven every ten minutes and swished them around to try and brown them evenly (lifes to short to turn them all over individually) they swished around the dish easily. When they were ready as there was practically no oil on the wedges or dish I just upended the baking tray and emptied the wedges into a large dish - not one thing stuck in any way. Normally even with a non-stick tray I can be found chipping the last of the wedges off with a fish slice.

When hubby went to do the dishes I heard a laugh as he noticed the foil covered dish. As I peered into the kitchen he noticed me and said "Do I really just have to take off this silver paper and not wash the dish?" I stayed to watch and once removed, which was done easily without any turns or splits in the paper, the dish was indeed ready to go away without any scrubbing whatsoever.

Next night was hotdog night so I covered the baking tray leaving the dull side facing upwards. The sausages were pricked and placed on top and each time I took them out of the oven to get them evenly browned they moved about easily. Obviously due to the amount of oil that came out of the sausages I couldn't just empty them out into a dish, but managed to remove them with a fork without tearing the silver foil, leaving the tray to be put away again without scrubbing.

Sunday came around and I was making chicken cordon bleu. This is just gorgeous so I'll share:

Wrap a couple of ¾" slices of a nice mature cheese in quite a thick slice of ham. Put slits in chicken breasts or flatten under clingfilm place the cheese and ham parcel inside and wrap the breast around it and sew back together with a couple of cocktail sticks. Place on the dull side of the foil.

Add salt, pepper, a splash of worcestershire sauce and lemon juice, place chopped onions around and anything else you fancy and add a knob of butter on top of each one. Then close up the silver foil and place in the oven at full power along with the roast potatoes when they have 35 minutes left to cook. Open the foil for the last five minutes to brown.

If all goes well and the cocktail sticks haven't pierced the foil these can again be easily removed and you get a tasty main course. As I cook this on a high heat I sometimes found the chicken would stick to normal foil which would then tear leaving a baking tray to be washed I've only used it once with this non-stick foil and managed not to tear it.

I know with the christmas turkey that removing the tinfoil towards the end to brown it was difficult as parts of it had stuck to the skin so this would be perfect.

The packaging adds that it is ideal for healthy cooking as you don't need to add oil and that it provides protection against freezer burn.

- - Would I buy it again - -

I will definitely purchase this again, as it saves so much time on washing up and although we have a dishwasher, we still wash pots, baking trays etc. by hand. Since my hubby washes up when I cook and has that manly habit of adding fairy liquid and hot water to a baking tray then leaving it to steep (which means I find it two hours later and have to refill with hot water and wash it myself) then I'm willing to pay what isn't an awful lot of extra money for this foil.

The fact that you use a new piece each time you cook also means that it won't lose its non-stickability the way that the trays do. So it should perform perfectly everytime.

Summary: Anything that saves scrubbing gets the thumbs up from me.