My husband gave me a cast iron pan for Christmas.  It's back-to-the-future at our home as this past winter we established our little urban farm.  We are trying to do as much as we can on our homestead which includes seven vegetable beds, six chickens, and making as much from scratch as we can (including body scrub and chicken stock).  As spring manifests itself I finally mustered up the courage to experiment with the new skillet. I figured that I can try to join the ranks of thousands of years of fabulous cooks.

We seasoned it (a process I will not detail here). We made bacon in it.  We roasted a chicken with maple syrup and balsamic vinegar. It was great.  However, I began to notice as we cleaned it that the seasoning (a coating) was coming off.  I frantically ran to my anxiety engine (I mean Google) and typed in various versions of "cast iron skillet coating coming off."  As I read through various sites' responses, I was caught off guard by the secret society I had unknowingly entered into.