# Cleaning of teflon pans?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cleaning-of-teflon-pans/388796>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [January 21, 2007, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cleaning-of-teflon-pans/388796 "2007-01-21T04:09:10Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\
**Post date:** [January 21, 2007, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cleaning-of-teflon-pans/388796/1 "2007-01-21T04:09:10Z")

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So, talking to various people, I have heard various instructions on how you should clean a teflon-coated frying pan, ranging from my parents “Wash it in the sink” to a supervisor I had in Texas “Just spray it with hot water” to a note on Wikipedia which suggests that they should only be wiped off.

So, which is it? Do they all work? One of our older pans is sorta beat-up and isn’t as non-sticky as it used to be, but it IS a very old pan. If washing it in the sink is gonna tear up the pan, I’d prefer not to do it, but then again, I don’t watch to catch Mad Pig Flu or something from not properly cleaning my cookery. 😃

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**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\
**Post date:** [January 21, 2007, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cleaning-of-teflon-pans/388796/2 "2007-01-21T05:02:03Z")

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Not all non-stick cooking surfaces are Teflon®. But for those that are: [Teflon cookware care](http://teflon.com/NASApp/Teflon/TeflonPageServlet?pageId=/consumer/na/eng/housewares/cookware/cookware/nonStick/cookwareCare/cookware_care.html).