I am thinking about cooking this pumpkin shepherd’s pie recipe and I noticed that it says you have to put it in a broiler proof dish before broiling it. Now, the cookware in my apartment is mostly inherited from its previous residents and other assorted friends of my roommates, so I have no idea what is and is not broiler proof. We have a couple metal baking dishes and a (regular not deep dish) glass pie dish. Is it very bad to assume that any given dish is broiler proof? What will happen if I misjudge?
If all you’re doing is browning the cheese for 5 minutes, oven-approved glass or ceramic like Corning would probably be fine. It also depends on your broiler. If you have an electric coil broiler that’s on the top of the oven, you’ll be fine.
If you have a gas broiler with a floor-level drawer, you’ll need a shallow and sturdy metal dish and you’ll need to remove the broiling pan from the drawer. Make sure the pan fits in there before putting food in it, and see how much clearance you’ve got if the casserole goes taller than the pan. I’m not even sure that would work with a drawer. It would be awfully close to the flame. Thinking about it more in the context of my own oven, I would probably put the flame on broil, but still put the dish in the oven, the cheese would still brown nicely but maybe take a couple minutes longer. A ceramic or glass or metal dish would work fine in that case.
ETA: glass or ceramic that gets too hot will at least crack in half, and has been known to shatter.