PTFC Coating on Cookware?

April 5, 2012 by Debra Lynn Dadd

Question from Daisy

Does anyone have any information on PTFC coatings on cookware? Recently I was at Williams Sonoma and saw their new "Gold Touch" line of cookware, which is advertised as having a non-stick ceramic coating. When I saw this I contacted the company to find out if it was a nano-ceramic coating, because I'm concerned about nano-particles and want to limit my exposure to these. They wrote back and said it was not a nano-ceramic coating but a PTFC coating. However, I can't seem to find any information on what PTFC is using regular search engines like Google. I'd like to know if this cookware is safe to use, I love to bake and they have a variety of great looking cake pans.

Debra's Answer

I just called Williams-Sonoma after looking at this cookware on their website.

The reason you couldn't find PTFC is because there is no such thing. Williams Sonoma told me the finish was "PTFE ceramic." The representative read it right off the screen. I asked her to repeat it. "PTFE ceramic."

Now PTFE is just the same old polytetrafluoroethylene, aka Teflon, which is very different from ceramic. Teflon is a toxic plastic, and ceramic is like glass. It's like saying it's an apple orange.

I pressed the rep to put me in touch with someone higher up and she wrote up a ticket about this.

The customer service rep called me back a few nights later and said she had a document in front of her that was an "internal customer service document" so she couldn't send it to me, but it said that according to the manufacturer of their "Gold Touch" line, "all of the non-stick finishes on their products sold in the USA are PTFE." The document said nothing about the finish being ceramic.

She further said that the Gold Touch finish "starts as PFOA but the high heat during the manufacturing process removes all the PFOA, leaving only PTFE."

Updated, 2020: For more information on cookware, read the Cookware Buying Guide.