Ear plugs (silicone). Don't waste your money on noise-cancelling headphones, I have $200 ones and they don't compare to simple ear plugs. If you live in a moderately noisy area and you want peace and quiet, get them. They basically just make everything quiet. 24 from CVS = $10.
OpenMove by Aftershokz - Bone-conduction headphones. Perfect for running and just good for listening to music. They work, they're way easier to wear and more comfortable than earpods, I haven't had any issues since I got them about 8-months ago. Plus, you can wear them with earplugs for music + noise cancellation. $99
Cast iron skillet. This is more of a personal preference. I hate getting new kitchenware and then worrying about breaking it or getting it all stained. But these are super easy to clean and AFAIK practically never wear out. Also very cheap (iirc $15).
Software:
JetBrains tools. Basically the only software I can imagine spending $250 a year on, and it actually being worth it.
Patreon and Github sponsors. Not much (I think $15 a month total). It's sad how few sponsors a lot of these projects have. I'm not rich, but I can afford donating $5/month here and there. I really think the world would be a better place if more people donate to open source and content creators they like.
Second cast iron. We use ours daily - and it's a handmedown from my grandmother who also used daily for 20+ years. Once seasoned properly, it is non-stick, cleans easy. We just be sure to put a little oil on it after each use. Really the only skillet you need.
I would like to throw in a strong rec for carbon steel.
I was (and to a degree still am) a big cast iron guy, but I find that these days I use my carbon steel pans much, much more frequently. They share many of the benefits of cast iron in terms of durability, oven safety, high temp cooking, natural non-stick, etc. However they can be much, much lighter and their heating properties make them superior for many, and I would argue most (but not all!), applications.
These days if someone said they needed 1 quiver killer pan, I would unquestionably recommend a carbon steel skillet over a cast iron one.
If you're someone who likes using cast iron, I think you are doing yourself a major disservice by not trying carbon steel.
I bought a set of carbon steel pans and my cast iron ones fell into complete disuse.
Especially carbon steel crepes pans (https://www.debuyer.com/en/poele-a-crepes-mineral-b-1472.htm...) are completely unbeatable. I have two of them and I can feed a small crowd of family and friends faster than they can eat. Nothing sticks if you take proper care.
Same here. After getting rid of our scratched teflon pans, we bought large and small de Buyer carbon steel pans. We have 2 cast iron pans also, but barely use them anymore. The lighter carbon steel ones are much more versatile.
We do, however, still use our cast iron griddle for making bacon in the oven. Comes out perfect every time.
For anyone reading who is new to carbon steel, the trick to non-stick cooking is making sure the pan gets hot. And if something does stick? It pretty much wipes right off while the pan is still hot.
Another trick is to use sharp metal utensils. If you use wood it will just smear stuff on the pan, not helping at all.
By complete accident my spatula is also from DeBuyer (https://www.debuyer.com/en/flexible-turner-slotted-fkofficiu...). It is very sharp and it easily scrapes anything that dares to stick (due to my mistake of not getting it hot enough), without smearing it.
I am not very experienced in the world of cooking but don't most chefs recommend _not_ using metal utensils on metal pans? I've never heard of carbon steel prior to today so is it special in some way?
Almost all woks and sometimes flat top grills in restaurants are made from carbon steel. Flipping burgers with metal spatulas has never been a problem for cooks. Same thing here. Although I've never really had to scrape mine with a metal utensil before. Just turn food. Seriously things rarely stick, unless I'm impatient about preheating.
Pros are they can take very high temperatures, you can be rough with them, are non-stick when seasoned and at a proper temperature (like cast iron), and much lighter than cast iron.
Cons are you don't want to cook liquidy acidic foods in them that often (removes the seasoning off the pan), they can rust easily if not seasoned, and require slightly more maintenance then stainless steel or Teflon pans. Basically you're not washing these with dish soap. Just a rinse, maybe some scrubbing with kosher salt, and heating it on the stove to dry and sterilize it.
Keeping it lightly oiled when cooking or storing it helps too. They're a great work-horse pans. We got ours after having to throw out our last scratched Teflon pans. Making scrambled eggs in carbon steel was hard at first, but over time as a better seasoning developed and figuring out the right temperatures to use, I now get the same results as I use to in Teflon.
The big win for cast iron is its higher heat capacity. It takes longer to heat up, but once hot, the temperature drops much less when you add cold / room temperature food to fry, resulting in crisper and less soggy output.
Heat capacity is not a straight win, it's a double edged sword. Like you said temp drops less when food goes in, and that can be great in certain applications. However, you also lose a lot in the way of temperature control. The slow rate at which it heats up and cools down means finer temperature adjustments are much harder to do.
In my experience the searing/frying performance of carbon steel is not an issue for the overwhelming majority of things I cook, ergo I don't really care that cast iron has a higher capacity. The tighter temperature control, on the other hand, is always nice.
I still use my cast irons sometimes for things where that heat capacity is really nice (searing a huge steak or something like that), but I use carbon steel much more frequently.
It also depends on your stove. Mine’s electric and alternates the heating element on and off to try to maintain the desired temp. The heat capacity helps to smooth out temperature fluctuations but if I had a nice gas stove I’d probably switch to carbon steel.
I bought a cheapy Lodge skillet -- 12", I think? -- a while back because I succumbed to the cast iron craze and really wanted to try cooking on induction. I figured I'd just upgrade to a bigger skillet when necessary.
It's now like 7 years later and my skillet shows no signs of giving up, and I don't think buying yet another kitchen device would make my wife happy. Should have gone with a bigger skillet to begin with.
Just wait until your kids get their hands on it. Mine is literally inherited from somebody's grandmother and it's awesome. Though sadly, its sibling died doing what it loved -- making bacon.
Also got a Lodge (two now, as you say, needed a bigger one as well). Took an angle grinder to it with an abrasive pad wheel installed. Smoothed it right up.
I did the same thing to mine. They have a rough surface when you buy them unlike old cast iron pans, apparently - though I don’t know if they’re smooth from use or came that way.
In the glory days, cast iron pans were milled perfectly smooth on the cooking surface.
Lodge casts their pans without surfacing, so you have a porous surface. I have a lodge and it's okay, but I prefer my antique Wagner when I can. It sticks less and it also has been in my family a really long time.
Everything! Boiling a pot of water is twice as fast if not more. More control over temperature. No risk to burn yourself, kitchen towels or other unwanted items. They never need deep-cleaning due to spilled food being burned onto the glass, one wipe with a cloth and it looks like new.
One drawback is they are often bundled with ridiculous touch-controls rather than knobs, even though that shouldn't need to be the case. You can find those without.
Youll probably want stainless steel or enamled cast iron for anything with fond.
Anytime you are cooking something acidic, tomatoes, vinegar, wine. I try not to deglaze meat brownings into sauce in cast iron.
A stainless steel dutch oven is a great universal pan as well. For a "first pan" I'd probably suggest tri ply stainless over cast iron. The main thing I like about cast iron more is the pan temperature not dropping when I put something on it, so its great for reverse searing baked steaks inside the house. Most other things I find functionally equivalent in stainless and cast iron, including browning meat before I cube it or break it apart. (brown cuts of meat and ground meat whole!)
> Anytime you are cooking something acidic, tomatoes, vinegar, wine. I try not to deglaze meat brownings into sauce in cast iron.
I wouldn't simmer an acidic sauce in cast iron for hours, but this is poor advice. Deglazing will not damage the seasoning on cast iron pan once it is properly seasoned (and maintaining that is easy, contrary to lots of what you hear).
Unlike to your experience, I don't find them functionally equivalent for a number of things, which is why I have both (and enamel cast, much better than almost all clad steel dutch ovens that aren't really expensive, as most of them don't clad far up the sides)
I've had one dish, with multiple deglazings, that tasted funny after. Ill admit it may have been in my head, or the pan was light on seasoning. Tasted almost like the metallic taste of Hoegaarden.
I have both, and I use 5-ply fully clad more than I use cast iron. My 9 qt is bottom clad only, but the lack of clad up the sides hasnt been an issue. The bottom surface is hot which is what needs to be hot on the stove. The sides arent getting hot spots in the oven, during brazing and stews.
YMMV obviously. I've got a 12" cast skillet that has had literally many hundreds of deglazings done in it, never once an issue. I suspect mostly when people have a taste issue in a cast iron pan it's because they've read nonsense about never using soap on it or whatever, and haven't cleaned it properly.
I did once ruin a seasoning making a tomato sauce, which was a way to learn about acidic interactions - but that was over hours.
FWIW I had a 5 qt like that calphon but found I was always using my enamel cast one instead, so gave it away.
One thing I really like about the cast iron skillit is you can treat it roughly and use it anywhere. Mines been in fire pits, on bbq, stovetop, oven, even a bread oven. Handles temperature changes without issues (unlike enamel and some clad) is unbeatable to sear things. Doesn't care what tools you use in it. Nonstick property is pretty good (better than steel pan, worse than teflon) and will still be pretty good in 20 years.
It could have been over a long period of time, more than an hour. Im not trying to spread misinformation, ive just "ruined" (I still ate it) a dish before, or imagined it.
I'm not discounting your experience, I was pushing back on the idea that you shouldn't deglaze in a cast iron pan.
Deglazing itself is a very fast process, usually seconds. If you are doing something over an hour, it's likely simmering. If you did that in a sauce that was still acidic (rather than had some acid thrown in to deglaze or whatever) then I could see that being a problem.
I gotcha. Honestly, I mostly like deglazing in stainless steel because I can see what I'm doing. I can tell I've scraped the brown off. And I prefer deglazing in stainless to enameled, because it feels like less effort.
I'm not super careful about not using acidic things in cast iron, and I do deglaze in it on occasion, it's just a little harder imho. I can see how my original comment reads.
I put quite a bit of effort into doing things "right" when I tried to board the cast-iron train. Pan was pre-seasoned, but I did one of those elaborate multi-step seasoning rituals online, using the expensive oil they recommended and everything, just in case. Horrible, smoke all over the house, smelled for a couple days. Everything sticks anyway, like I've never seen on any other kind of pan. Suitably-gentle cleaning (according to cast iron fans online) takes forever because there's so much crap on it after every use. Re-seasoned it again after a bit, thinking I'd screwed up. No improvement, everything sticks. My wife refuses to cook with it at all, and I'm pretty sure just seeing it in the drawer annoys her.
Oh, and if a tomato or anything else somewhat-acidic touches it then the entire dish will taste like blood. So that's fun.
It's alright for cooking steak (preheating for a few minutes on high is a must, though, it's gotta be terrifyingly hot or everything will stick, including steak), and if I drown things in scorching-hot oil or fat (say, from bacon) they they don't stick much, but that sure isn't healthy. The pan has zero inherent non-stickness, only what it acquires from whatever lake of oil I put in it.
They never get as non-stick as a Teflon coating, but over time they’re usable for pretty much everything.
Screw babying it. Get a chain mail cleaner for it (and you definitely can use soap), use the pan often and especially when you’re doing something oily, and soon enough you’ll use it a lot.
I'm going to second this. I don't understand why people keep buying cast iron when steel has the same core traits(durability primarily) but so many more upsides. Thinner, lighter, heats faster. Steel is where it's at IMO. Enameled for anything acidic otherwise your seasoning is gone.
And iron leached into whatever your eating. I know thats considered in the myth category, but I have at least one dish Ive prepared that ended up tasting pretty metallicy. Could be expectations manifesting reality.
I think people get turned off to steel when they put a new pan on the stove, dont let it heat up, bake something to it, and its an arm and a leg to clean the first time. Unlike nonstick, it has a bit of a learning curve. Cast iron doesnt show stains the same way, and you can use a chain mail scrubber. Scratching steel does slightly change its nonstick properties, so dont use steel wool.
I have a cast iron skillet and a stainless steel skillet, and I almost always use the stainless. The cast iron almost always only comes out when I need a second skillet.
When I'm searing something, I even prefer that it sticks slightly more to the stainless as it typically releases when it's done anyways -- and my anecdotal experience is that I get a better sear from the surface of the meat sticking to the skillet more firmly.
Cast iron gives additional radiant heat because it's black, so if I am cooking steak in the oven I pretend like it gives me more uniform temperature increase than depending on conductive and convective heat. If I am browning meat and not baking it after, Ill use steel.
I like cast iron for potatoes too. Hashes. Not sure why. Holds temp better?
Professional cooks use a ton of stuff, and not all of it would be what they choose at home.
Carbon steel is great, requires a little upkeep, but part of what makes it great is how it works with a really high heat source; the stoves in a restaurant behave very differently than your home one.
An extreme case of this is woks. There is very little you can do at home to reproduce the effect of an 80k BTU burner and a carbon steel wok.
I agree, 15k BTU is not 80k, but with a little patience on preheating (I don't have waiting customers) I still enjoy working in the wok I own. Also, it is not a restaurant sized wok, but for flash frying chopped food, or getting a nice quick sear, it works great.
I received a Griswold cast iron skillet from my grandmother, who received it from her mother (my great grandmother) many years ago. True heirloom, I cook with it nearly every day and it still looks and performs beautifully.
We have a couple cast irons. When I was first introduced to them I was pretty turned off by the idea of not doing the same soap and water scrub process I do with everything else.
But handling them now is just part of the ritual.
The biggest change I’ve had since starting using them a couple years ago is moving from the ball scrubby disposable two a Chainmaile ringlet style scrubby.
Using the chain mail has a different feel it slides easier and it washes clean much easier.
I recommend checking out the chain mail style scrubbers for cast-iron.
> I was pretty turned off by the idea of not doing the same soap and water scrub process I do with everything else.
You can mostly do the same soap and water scrub as everything else. Assuming you use a reasonably modern dish soap an not something harsh, if you don't leave it soaking in the soapy water it will be fine.
Yep the “don’t use soap on cast iron” is a holdover from older soaps that had lye in them that could strip the seasoning (hence why you can use lye to reseason your pan).
If your seasoning is perfect (it isn’t) you could in theory leave it to soak too since it would be completely encased in the polymerized fat.
Yeah, the "don't soak it rule" isn't because it will explode if it's underwater for long, just that there are inevitably gaps and it doesn't do you any good. Just get it in there, have a good scrub, and rinse off.
Staub iron cookware has an enamel, so it does not require seasoning nor does it have issues with tomatoes or other acidic things. I use their cocotte, since I often put things in the oven but it's also good for e.g. steaks at max temperature.
I used to think noise-cancelling headphones were a gimmick. I'm also pretty indifferent to audio quality, so I never expected to buy expensive headphones. But I had an opportunity to try out one of the best options available right now, and the noise cancelling performance blew me away.
With the closed-back cups sealing over my ears, and the noise cancelling active, I can only just hear normal-volume conversation next to me. When also playing music, I can't hear any normal sounds around my house. With white noise and earplugs as well, I literally can't hear a baby screaming.
5 years ago, I got a pair of Sennheiser over-the-ear noise-cancelling headphones for long flights after realizing how loud I had the volume turned up on earbuds. I'm happy enough with them, but they're too plasticy for the price and rather bulky for traveling (so I'm considering Airpods Pro), but on a flight, noise canceling is absolutely not a gimmick.
I wouldn't give up on Sennheiser without looking at their new offerings just quite yet. I just bought a noise cancelling over the ear pair from them (after returning my XM4s) and their build quality is excellent - metal, leather, high quality plastic.
Just an FYI here for those unaware, but Sennheiser recently sold off their consumer headphone division [0], so the future of Senn's great headphones is very much a mystery at the moment
I had AKG headphones. I noticed a difference when noise cancellation was on, but there was a weird humming sound and they didn't work very well for me. Also, they're very bulky and you can't wear them while sleeping.
> With white noise and earplugs as well, I literally can't hear a baby screaming.
That's one benefit of headphones: if the earplugs aren't enough, you can do earplugs + headphones for ultimate noise-cancellation.
Can't speak for OP, but I recently bought a pair of Sony WH-1000XM4 headphones and I'm pretty impressed. They don't make me feel the pressure in my ear like some do, and the noise suppression is just about magic. My wife has to text me from downstairs to tell me my kids are fighting even when it's just outside the door to my office, because I can't hear them at all (and I don't turn up the volume on my music). Just turning them on without any music makes it hard to understand someone talking in the same room.
Which do you prefer? I’ve been rocking the Bose QC35 II’s for years but am wondering if in-ear solutions can compete now for commuting on foot (metro, buses, etc.)
I loved my XM3. They eventually broke, and I replaced them with the AirPod Max as I’m all-in on Apple gear. Returned those within a week. The weight, the size, and the ANC side effects made it unusable for all-day wear. Some people love them, but I was disappointed. I’m back to XM, with newfound appreciation.
You can try both for a week, and return the set that doesn’t fit into your life. Both Apple and Sony can handle a refund.
That kind of headphones really was a significant upgrade for me. Being able to listen to something while still having environmental awareness is awesome.
I do wish the max volume for the aftershokz where higher, and they didn't have the play/pause button trigger a redial when double pushed. I've accidentally done that multiple times (Including scaring my parents with a middle of the night call, due to 9 hours time difference.)
If you never use them for calling, you can go into Bluetooth settings and disable Calls/Phone access for that device. At least, this is possible on Android.
A pleasant property of the cast iron skillet is that I can preheat it to an exact temperature in the oven. To make popcorn I drop some ghee in it and put it in and set the preheat to 450. The second the oven comes to temperature I pull it out, put it on medium high add the corn and cover and shake occasionally. Usually have from zero to at most five unpopped kernels this way.
The preheat in the oven trick is good for steaks too.
I agree. Aftershokz changed my running completely. I pair them with my garmin fenix and no longer have to deal with wires or being isolated from my environment.
Personally I think these are a waste of money unless you live in a house. Trying to season one of these smoked up our apartment for hours. Apparently we didn't do it right because it's still sticky even with oil, but there's no way we're going through the headache again until we have a house.
I used cast iron in my apartment for five years. My range was even electric.
The cast iron community of the internet overthinks its care and usage. To season, just use it. To use it, don't restrict yourself (some recommend against tomato sauce because of the acidity, for. example). To clean it, get yourself as scrubber [1] to remove the high spots and wipe the remaining residue with a paper towel. Done.
It's a hearty hunk of metal that's been in kitchens for generations. It can withstand a lot.
This is so true. I guarantee my ancestors out in the woods of Pennsylvania didn't spend any time deliberately seasoning their skillets. They were tools to be used, not decorations to be delicately and painstakingly maintained.
So much this. Forget all the weird voodoo rituals and what-not. Clean the skillet, and fry a pound of bacon (or two) in it. Now it's seasoned. It isn't much more complicated than that.
Animal fats are better than vegetable oils. Vegetable oils polymerize into a sticky substance. You don't really need to season a cast iron pan. Just keep it oiled, use a metal spatula, and wash after use(deglaze if needed). The metal spatula helps keep the cook surface smooth.
There's unfortunately no published scientific research on what oil should be used for seasoning, but this source is pretty convincing to me that flaxseed is bad:
I am about to move into a new-construction apartment in California which means no gas stove.
Ditched my cast iron in anticipation because the one I have has a rough bottom that would definitely scratch up the glass cook top of the electric stove.
Since I ditched the cast iron, honestly haven't seen much of a difference in how well I can cook things using a regular nonstick pan - my main use is cooking/frying up chicken thighs so the skin is nice and crispy.
Buying the cast iron did give me the original inspiration to start making these recipes though.
Really the only advantage of cast iron is it is cheap, lasts forever, and you can bake with them. Other than that any pan works about the same. Your choices are about a compromise of weight, how long it lasts, and price. I do once make in my cast iron once in a while, but other than that any pan I have works. I keep the cast iron on the stove though because it is my favorite.
Regular non-stick works just as well for about 3 years or so (very much depends on how much you use it, and how careful you are), then the non-stick wears out and they stick worse than anything else.
I have stainless pans that work just as well as cast iron, but they cost more. They end up spending most of the time hidden away but I do use them and won't get rid of them.
We use a couple cast-iron skillets on our glass-topped electric-coil stove (likely from the 90s?). One skillet has a bump on the bottom that I haven’t filed off yet. The glass surface seems fine, but if you’re renting it makes sense to be cautious.
You can just use it like a normal, heavy duty pan. The difference in use and flavor between seasoned and unseasoned is pretty minor, IMO.
The real advantage is that they're so cheap relative to their utility. They heat evenly and stand up to incredible abuse at a fraction of the cost of a normal pan.
Note that seasoning cast iron has nothing to do with flavor. It refers to the coating that develops after seasons of use. The primary benefit is that it prevents rust. A very nice side effect is that food tends to stick to it less. Seasoning is best accomplished in a controlled environment, but it's also fine to just start using it (with oil) and lightly clean without soap after use. Eventually, it might start to develop a useful coating in key areas.
I steam clean it (hot water + hot pan + stiff brush), then back on the stove to dry off and apply a light layer of avocado oil.
Leave it shiny on your stove and ready for next use.
The important thing with cast iron is to clean it immediately, before you've started eating. But this is actually pretty easy because steam cleaning is so effective and cast iron is really durable.
It takes about 30 seconds to clean it and rub with oil.
Clad steel is a nice middle ground, either with aluminum or copper. More even heat distribution, long lasting without the care regimen of cast iron. They arent expensive either.
Huh, TIL. I had assumed the thickness of the iron would have lead to better heating, but it looks like both aluminum and steel heat much more evenly.
I still argue that the care regimen is overblown, you can scrub with soap and a sponge and as long as you're not just grinding at the surface it will be fine. You can soak it, it's fine. We treat our cast iron like any other pan and it's really not a big deal - we just add appropriate oil if we took off too much of the bonded oil the last time we cooked.
Totally agree. They are not easy to clean and need to season properly with a bit of oil and mine always smells of cooking oil that is stuck on it and never comes off how much I wash it.
Edit: The cooking oil we mostly use is Ghee (clarified butter) to cook vegetarian dishes on our cast iron skillet.
Baking soda will remove the polymerized oil. What type of oil you use is important. Animal fats don't polymerize like most vegetable oils do. If your pan smells like the last thing you cooked wash it, dry it with heat, and wipe a thin layer of oil to store it.
A metal spatula is necessary as well. Plastic and rubber aren't stiff enough to scrape the cook surface smooth.
I love my cast iron skillet for some things (and have a house), but I can’t see how having a house made the seasoning process any different than if I’d done it it my old apartment. It smoked the same and the kitchen exhaust fan did an OK-not-great job of pulling it outside, just like it would have in my old apartment kitchen which also had a range vent that went outside (and frankly worked better than my house one which is downdraft due to fancy-kitchen design shenanigans).
I think the main difference might be that in your house, if you season a pan and end up with lots of lasting smoke everywhere, or even an errant fire alarm, you own it so you can elect to not care. In an apartment, neighbors might complain.
You can get enameled ones you don't need to season. Le Creuset makes expensive examples. I love mine. I like that works well in both the oven and stove.
I'm guessing it is a vent hood over the stove you are missing in the apartment? That allows us to season our cast iron skillets without any headache.
Picked up a chainmail-like "dish rag" (it is truly just a swatch made up of links of metal) that beautifully cleans the skillet after meals but preserves the seasoning.
Do you not have a standard hood over your stove? Seasoning has never caused issues for me in the 4 or so places I've lived and done this. Usually keeping the oven door shut fixes 98% of the issues, and the fan above on high sucks up anything else.
Live in an apartment and it’s not been a problem, if it was still sticky you probably used too much oil. And once seasoned you can just quickly wash with soap, dry, very lightly coat and with oil and toss on the burner till it starts to smoke.
How does the ownership structure of your residence affect your ability to clear smoke from a room, or your ability to effectively season a cast iron skillet?
The apartments that my friends and I live in have small windows and only on one side, and one door. Not to mention that venting smoke out into a hallway can just trigger hallway smoke alarms.That's not really a scenario where I want to deal with a lot of smoke.
In houses (notice I never said anything about ownership, don't know why you brought that up), you can open up windows on all sides and generally have at least two doors, which allows for much better ventilation than what's possible in the apartments that I've been in recently.
Some apartments you can't open the front door or the smoke will set off the whole building. You also have a harder time turning off fire alarms since the building doesn't want people disabling them as they are all entwined.
If they do this again they might risk someone calling the super or the landlord. I have heard it's pretty easy to get evicted in the US, even using a loud blender can get you in trouble.
No it's not. It's not that easy. It's actually hard and annoying to evict someone. You can stay in an apartment for months in California while paying no rent.
I never heard of bone-conduction headphones. They seem very interesting and I'd love to try them. Are they OK for calls, or only music? And also - is there any health issue I should be aware?
Just in case the word "conduction" triggered the question about health risk: in this case it just means the sound is transferred by direct contact of the resonator on the speaker with your cheekbone (well, as direct as going through the skin can be). There's no electrical signal going into your body, just vibration moving through your skull directly to the inner ear, rather than via air into the air canal.
Music is actually pretty unsatisfying at any volume above background levels in an otherwise-quiet room, since any significant bass through the conduction 'phones actually makes them jump out of contact with your head, resulting in a buzz you can feel + hear. Calls, podcasts, YT videos, etc. all work great.
What do you do to listen to music? I try to use some Edifier desktop speakers during the day for most things, but seem to be okay with some airpod pro use. I kind of need that for walking the cat and sometimes to distract myself doing chores.
I sometimes allow APM's but I have to keep the volume really low and the duration short. I probably shouldn't use them at all but I miss the richness of music too much.
I really liked the Airpod Pros until I started to associate their use with worsening tinnitus. Now I'm trying big headphones with no ANC. But I definitely don't have any solutions.
Why was the earplugs + bone-conducing headphones bad for tinnitus? Sounds like a good combination on paper - block out external noises with the plugs and play white noise on headphones to cover tinnitus. I currently use noise-cancelling phones for that, but of course the earplugs will do better for noise cancelling.
This is just conjecture, but I think tinnitus is caused by vibration of the inner ear that doesn't come from the eardrum. The inner ear is designed to be resonant for audio frequencies, and the earplugs contain them, maybe too much. Just N=1 longitudinal study involving an early stage career and now way too much podcast listening. Covering tinnitus doesn't make it better. Covering the 'noise' is futile. The best you can do is try not to make it worse. You'll never get relief. But you can achieve surrender.
I have been (just barely) covering my tinnitus for the past ~9 years and I'm better off for it. The sound that I replace it is much less annoying than the tinnitus sound. I believe Tinnitus Retraining Therapy is about doing something like that.
What I’m saying is that bone conduction, including tight seals of earbuds, or even use of earplugs in certain environments (roadies etc), might actually be far worse than the sound coming into the ear canal by air conduction. This seems to be my experience.
Bone conduction headphones are kind of like the opposite of noise cancelling. I like them primarily for sport use. Whether trail running, MTB, or in the gym, bone conduction headphones do not block outside noise. So wearing them I am more aware of my environment, which is important if people are coming up behind me on a trail.
Not always great. A good rule of thumb: could you easily hear someone talking next to you at a normal speaking volume? If so, you'll be able to hear with the headphones just fine. If not, you probably won't.
My Aftershokz are good for spoken word in noisy/trafficy environments unless I'm inside a car at freeway speeds, or operating a lawn mower. They could work in a car if they got a little louder.
Just be aware that they make it practical to tell that something is happening around you, but with spoken word you'll usually have to pause to tell what is happening around you. I.e., I can't understand what someone is saying to me if a narrator is already speaking into my ear.
Cast iron is so extremely versatile and durable. I’ve had this one iron skillet for 23 years and it just seems to get better with age. I would also highly recommend enameled iron cookware like pots and pans from Le Cruset (it doesn’t have to be that brand though, there are plenty of excellent off-brand alternatives that are just as good and a lot cheaper).
As for headphones, I obsess over the Sony MDR-7506s, which to my ears are the best sounding headphones ever made. These are old-school wired studio monitors and they outperform any hyped “high-end” overpriced headphones. They have a neutral, accurate sound and are surprisingly inexpensive. You can still get then new for about $100. They are my secret audio weapon.
Oh and I love Jetbrains tools. I specifically use RubyMine quite a bit. VSCode (with the Ruby and Rails plugins) is great, but RubyMine is just very mature and polished, and it feels professional.
What brand ear plugs do you recommend? I bought some just last week on amazon (some foam ones from Howard Leight) and it was a toss-up which were good and which were bad according to the reviews and descriptions.
Earplugs are fussy things. But usually as long as they're not 'corks'(the old yellow foam cylinders)you should be fine.
Least with Howard Light it's Greens<Pinks<Oranges. Greens should be more than enough and are 'softer' if you've got a smaller ear canal. All of them work well.
You have to ensure you're putting them in correctly. Read the box. Roll the plug in your fingers, reach your other arm over you head to grab the top of the opposite ear, gently pull on the top of your ear, and insert the plug. You should feel & hear it expand forming a seal.
You can reuse foam ones a couple of times(can even get them corded), but be very, very wary of infections. And always put the same earplug back in the same ear(thus you don't spread anything).
I've tried just about every musician earplug on the market, including custom molded electric ones. For any amount of money, the best results I've had were with https://www.earasers.net/products/earasers. If I were to re-purchase these, I would consider the EU rated ones, which have a few extra DBs of protection.
I would say these are both good enough for the casual musicians / audience members. I would only upgrade back to electric ones if I were buying actual in ear monitors, but I doubt any of my bands will get to that point.
If you've got some money, get custom molded earplugs made for sleeping. Places selling hearing aids sell them. They spray some foam in your ear to take the print, and you get the custom plugs in the mail a few weeks later.
€140 is a lot for earplugs but it's amazing that they just slot into place in your ear, they're easy to pull out, and they're so small you don't feel them wether you're lying on them or wear headphones over them.
I recommend etymotic research ones. They cut frequencies more uniformly. The typical foam ones are slightly better at noise reduction, but they make everything sound incredibly muffled. I haven't had issues with any particular brand of foam ones though, if just cutting out noise is your goal.
The best would be custom molded earplugs, but those are fairly expensive.
I'm glad you recommended them because if you hadn't, I would have. Like you said they're particularly useful for preserving your hearing at live music venues without muddling the audio. As someone who didn't have hearing protection and attended some really loud venues, the hearing damage I have is a real pain the backside. There's a deep notch in the middle of my hearing range so going to a pub means I hear shuffling of feet and clinking of glasses better than I hear people talking to me even though they're closer and louder. Similarly cranking up the audio on a conference line means getting a painful spike of noise from join/leave beeps when the levels are right to hear speakers clearly.
Can't recommend that people wear hearing protection enough in general and at least for me etymotic make for a pleasant experience.
It's a complex answer, but I'll see what I can do to simplify it.
First, humans associate louder sound levels with higher quality, up to a point. Frequencies which can't be heard at lower levels become audible at higher levels.
Second, human ears adapt to a reasonably large range of sounds.
Third, sound levels decay with distance, which is why in ear phones use tiny amounts of power (a few milliwatts) and speaker systems for arena concerts can use megawatts. They also decay unevenly by frequency.
A classical Western concert with a full orchestra, unamplified, often has peak levels around 90 dB in the first few rows of seating. An amplified rock concert is trying to provide body-stirring levels of sound for people a hundred meters or more away from the stage.
That's the technical why. The personal why? Loud music literally moves you. It's not something I want every day, but it's fun on occasion.
This was a big one for me. I donate ~2 to not just projects I happen to like, but to ones that I've used and have given me a good return on investment.
I did ear plugs for a long time but really disliked the discomfort (to me at least) of inserting them in my ears. I found hearing protectors, typically made for industrial purposes, to be much more comfortable and effective.
Just do a search for "noise reduction earmuff" for this option. They're obviously not a good solution for sleeping but work well for working.
I think some people have narrow or more sensitive ear canal. Give a try to kids' ear plugs and also see instructions how to insert them correctly (effortlessly by pulling the ear up). I had a issue with foam ear plugs due to the pressure, but kids' foam ear plugs are perfect for me, even for side sleeping.
I dislike the ear plugs that I bought. I really like my noise cancelling heaphone and use it most of the day but unfortunately they are not ergonomic for sleep. 1- headphone plastic rubbing against cloth is noisy; 2- I sleep on my side and that puts unbearable pressure on the head.
Yeah ... but if I wear earplugs I prefer my 5-way [1] in-ears ... ;-)
No idea why people need noise-canceling, those (and my drumming headphones) seal pretty well against the outside ... once I put music on I don't hear a thing anymore.
That said ... I use the bone-conducting ones pretty regularly on the bike and while running.
[1] Not really 5 way ... 1x low, 2x mid, 2x high balanced amatures.
You really liked the OpenMove for running? I've been struggling to find really stable BlueTooth phones. (I liked the Pixel-branded wired phones, actually, but for stupid reasons they no longer seem to work with my phone.)
I run a whole bunch, so it matters a lot. My favorite thus far have been surprisingly cheap ($20) "retro" JLab phones that look like the kind I used to run with before everybody switched to earbuds. Build quality is mediocre but I just want to be able to hear stuff.
I'd be willing to spend $79 on the OpenMove (that's what I see on their web site), but it's a very different approach so it's good to know that it works for you.
Ear plugs are really important for being a nomad and traveling. You never know how noisy a place might be and the noise level could actually change during your stay. I typically bring 30. But more is always better.
Ear plugs (silicone). Don't waste your money on noise-cancelling headphones, I have $200 ones and they don't compare to simple ear plugs. If you live in a moderately noisy area and you want peace and quiet, get them. They basically just make everything quiet. 24 from CVS = $10.
OpenMove by Aftershokz - Bone-conduction headphones. Perfect for running and just good for listening to music. They work, they're way easier to wear and more comfortable than earpods, I haven't had any issues since I got them about 8-months ago. Plus, you can wear them with earplugs for music + noise cancellation. $99
Cast iron skillet. This is more of a personal preference. I hate getting new kitchenware and then worrying about breaking it or getting it all stained. But these are super easy to clean and AFAIK practically never wear out. Also very cheap (iirc $15).
Software:
JetBrains tools. Basically the only software I can imagine spending $250 a year on, and it actually being worth it.
Patreon and Github sponsors. Not much (I think $15 a month total). It's sad how few sponsors a lot of these projects have. I'm not rich, but I can afford donating $5/month here and there. I really think the world would be a better place if more people donate to open source and content creators they like.