I was pretty ambitious today and tried to film two videos for the channel, one on Banh Cuon and one on coffee brewing using a drip coffee maker, a French press, and an Aeropress. The Banh Cuon video did not go as smoothly as I hoped it would… because not only did I mess up the proportions of rice flour/tapioca flour/cornstarch to use, but my nonstick Scanpan suddenly decided to fail, and fail quite miserably. It was so bad that the rice batter started disintegrating into the pan, and there was not even mush left; it just vanished into thin air! It was food filming gone completely awry.

I bought two Scanpans ages ago, one 8-inch and one 10-inch, thinking that maybe if I invested in pans that were more expensive and supposedly healthier (no teflon coating), that these might actually last longer. My 10-inch Scanpan failed a while ago, resulting in my shipping in it to evaluate the damages, and they sent me a new one. I had to pay for the shipping, though, which cost over $20. Nowadays, you can get a new ceramic, non-toxic, nonstick pan for about $25, so the idea of paying that again to replace another faulty product just seems a bit senseless. But the sad thing this shows is that…no, you do not always get what you pay for. Paying more for something doesn’t always mean it will be better or last longer, sadly. And paying for a fancy brand name will definitely not mean you will be in the clear.