If you’ve spent any time on FoodTok or followed food influencers on Instagram over the past few years, you’ve probably seen an ad for Our Place’s Always Pan. When it launched in 2019, it practically broke the internet thanks to its combination of trendy colors, clever marketing, relentless omnipresence, and a bold promise: This is a pan you will use…always. For every meal.
The multifunctional ceramic-coated nonstick pan was designed to replace multiple traditional cookware pieces. According to the marketing, it could “braise, sear, steam, strain, sauté, fry, boil, bake, roast, and serve.” With a color-drenched body and matching lid, built-in spatula rest, and a nesting steamer basket, it offered an all-in-one solution for low-maintenance weeknight cooking. PFAS-free, it was poised to appeal to shoppers who were looking to ditch their Teflon at a time when public conversation about toxic “forever chemicals” was at a fever pitch.
To be completely transparent: I wasn’t ready to like this pan. I owned the first-generation Always Pan, which scorched and scratched easily and lost its nonstickiness quickly. In 2023, Our Place released the Always Pan 2.0, an upgraded version that promised to address the issues of the first iteration. Naturally, I was curious to see if this new model lived up to the hype.
After cooking with the Always Pan 2.0 for the past five months, I’m a convert. I never thought I’d want another nonstick pan after tossing the first-gen model (I’ve been using heavy-duty, well-seasoned cast iron for my nonstick-needing tasks ever since), but I haven’t taken this upgraded version off my stovetop since it arrived.
Here are my thoughts on the Always Pan 2.0: what worked, what didn’t, and who it’s good for.
In this story
What I cooked
I tested the Always Pan 2.0 across a variety of meals over the last five months, using it for most of my cooking whenever possible. I steamed soup dumplings, reheated frozen potstickers from Trader Joe’s, meal-prepped a beef burrito bowl, seared snap peas and shrimp, scrambled eggs, and even made a one-pot pasta. I cooked with it when sleep-deprived and delirious after late-night flights and on slow Saturday mornings with nothing but brunch on my mind.
What I like about the Always Pan 2.0
Going into this review, I thought, I test kitchen gadgets for a living. I know chefs don’t like nonstick. Using this pan is pointless because I only need stainless steel or cast iron. And I was wrong. Despite my loyalty to stainless-steel and cast-iron pans, I found myself reaching for the Always Pan more often than I expected.
