My recent trips to Mexico have been spent in part searching for great bean pots to import. I see many styles I like but it often comes down to the usage of lead. Some of the workshops have no problem using a non-lead glaze but others think I’m insane for asking.
I was quite erroneously told once that it’s only the vibrant colors, especially the green, that have lead. I can tell you now from experience there’s not much rhyme or reason. On this last trip I was told over and over that the alternative was animal and I wasn’t sure what they were talking about until I lay in bed at my hotel, replaying the days events, and realizing they were saying enamel.
Rick Bayless, in Rick Bayless’s Mexican Kitchen writes:
Yes, and most Mexican earthenware pots have lead glazes. You’ll have to make up your own mind, but let me tell you the essentials: It takes time and acid to leach lead from glazes. So stay away from very acidic food, don’t store foods in them or simply boil vinegar-water in them until all has evaporated to a lead-filled residue, then scrub the residue out (this affects the color). Other than that, I encourage you to enjoy your cazeula from time to time- they have been a traditional and integral part of the Mexican kitchen for centuries.
What do you think? Have you tried the vinegar trick? How acidic is acidic? If I make a standard chile sauce and squeeze lime or pour vinegar in, is that acid enough to leach out the lead into my sauce? I tend to want to believe him, but I’m the guy who has been incredibly lucky eating street food from Puebla to Bombay.
I don’t worry too much about it. What have they done in Mexico for hundreds of years?
I remember my high school chemistry teacher telling me that you have to pour straight distilled white vinegar into those dishes to leach out the lead. As long as we’re okay drinking diet soda out of aluminum cans and cooking eggs in non-stick frying pans, I’m not going to be too worried about putting chile sauce in a clay pot.
Please read this on lead safety on pottery:
http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:9HeakI90xIEJ:www.potters.org/subject16815.htm+safety+of+lead+glazes+on+pottery&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=us
I would be super worried about using a lead-glazed pot. I have been searching for a cool earthenware pot to cook my beans in – sur la table and williams sonoma don’t have any! i found a beautiful stoneware pot but it’s not technically supposed to be used on the stove (or so the woman in david mellor, the amazing london cookware boutique told me). anyway i hope you are able to find lead-free pots to import because i am eager to get my hands on one. ps. just made those beautiful black and white spotted beans of yours for dinner they were lovely! they remind me of little cows.
I would be super worried about using a lead-glazed pot. I have been searching for a cool earthenware pot to cook my beans in – sur la table and williams sonoma don’t have any! i found a beautiful stoneware pot but it’s not technically supposed to be used on the stove (or so the woman in david mellor, the amazing london cookware boutique told me). anyway i hope you are able to find lead-free pots to import because i am eager to get my hands on one. ps. just made those beautiful black and white spotted beans of yours for dinner they were lovely! they remind me of little cows.
Friends don’t let friends become poisoned by lead-glazed pottery, period. There are substitutions for lead in ceramic glazes at the temperatures fired for these pots. I am all for honoring tradition, but just don’t die or become disabled for it!
Ron Roy, a respected ceramic-glaze researcher and potter would be a very wise person to communicate with about this. (Could some traditional potters Google him?). He could indicate a direction to go in regards to safe, lead free pottery that is fired at the same temperatures as that of the traditional cazuelas. Lead is usually a cheaper glaze-flux though and is probably why it’s still being used in some areas in Mexico and in other parts of the world.
Be Safe and Healthy and eat lots of beans cooked in clay pots! Right Steve?
I Googled “cazuelas without lead glazes” and found many suppliers.
using a lead glaze pot a few times a year probably won’t hurt you. i would not sell it (liability) and i certainly would not feed children from it.
the problem is that it’s really difficult to get the glaze to fit correctly on the pot at the temperature earthenware is fired. small flaws in the glaze crack and leach metals – likely from first use on.
in latin american countries the lead for the glaze may come out of used car batteries; a very common and inexpensive resource! i don’t much like to think of small villages with industries of battery disassembly.
there are plenty of clean alternatives at that temperature. some of them will be a good deal more expensive, but i am confident there are mexican potters with the technical knowledge to create an inexpensive, lead-free earthenware glaze.