Get a grip on hot pots and pans with these top performers.
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No matter what you see the pros do on TV, a simple dish towel isn't adequate for pulling hot pots and pans out of the oven. Nothing ruins a batch of chocolate chip cookies or a sheet pan dinner quite like dropping everything on the floor just as it's finished because you slightly mishandled a bit of fabric. What you need instead is an insulated oven mitt.
Different styles and materials are all about personal preference, but what matters most is that an oven mitt protects your hands, whether that's from a simmering pan on the stove or the blazing flames of an outdoor grill. We tested more than two dozen of the best oven mitts, putting our fingertips on the line to hold hot dishes and rating characteristics like design and ease of cleaning. Our tests proved that these oven mitts can take the heat.
We loved these mitts for their high thermal capacity, exceptional grip, and smart design.
They can't handle the ultra-high heat of broiling or grilling.
The Big Red House oven mitts were the obvious standout in testing. They were the only model to earn perfect scores across all the rating categories. We were impressed with the grippy silicone surface, and that the mitts extend almost up the forearm. They were super comfortable to wear, and heat-proof enough that we could hold a hot casserole dish indefinitely without our fingers getting hot.
These mitts can handle almost any home kitchen situation, but they're not the best choice for super-hot cooking. They can handle up to 480°F, which is a little below the maximum temperature of most ovens, and well below the maximum for a grill.
Dimensions: 12.5 x 7 x 2 inches | Materials: Polyester, cotton, silicone | Machine-Washable: Yes | Maximum Temperature: 480°F
Food & Wine / Russell Kilgore
Food & Wine / Mary Hodes
Food & Wine / Russell Kilgore
Food & Wine / Russell Kilgore
The unique design of these mitts lets them grip and maneuver just about anything with ease.
The rectangular shape can dip into food (or flames) by accident.
You might not expect a 4-pack of pot holders that sells for less than many single ones would be very good. But the Ritz Royale Collection Pot Holders don't sacrifice quality for their quantity. We loved the design of these mitts; it's easy to get your thumb and fingers into the slits on the back, and the textured pattern on the front gives an excellent grip. We had no problems with scorched palms or fingers in testing.
However, the design has a slight downside. Since the rectangular holders aren't the same shape as your hand, the overhanging fabric can potentially dip down into food, or even the flames of a stove burner. Make sure to watch what you're doing.
Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.75 inches | Material: Cotton | Machine-Washable: Yes | Maximum Temperature: 500°F
We love the flexible glove and high cuff of these incredibly heatproof mitts.
They're pretty expensive, as oven mitts go.
The combo of soft cotton and flexible silicone makes Food52's Five Two Silicone Oven Mitts something special. The thin silicone layer is super-flexible but still has exceptional insulation against even the blazing heat of a gas grill. The plush interior feels luxurious on your fingers, and the extra-long cuff protects almost to the elbow. Associate commerce editor Mary Claire Lagroue bought a pair for home after using them in the test kitchen. "My hands have never gotten overheated," she says. "The silicone top half has a nice grip and is easy to clean; I’ll just wipe off spilled liquids or rinse that part of the mitt under the sink with some soap. I also put them in the washing machine occasionally."
For storage, there's a fabric loop you can hang on a hook, as well as a built-in magnet that will stick to the fridge or steel appliances. Oh, and did we mention how cute these are? The aesthetically pleasing design comes in five pastel-ish colors.
Dimensions: 15 x 7 inches | Materials: Cotton, silicone | Machine-Washable: Yes | Maximum Temperature: 650°F
Food & Wine / Russell Kilgore
Food & Wine / Russell Kilgore
Food & Wine / Russell Kilgore
This extra-heatproof silicone mitt has an extra-comfy removable cotton insert.
The fairly high price includes just one mitt.
This Mastrad mitt is the perfect marriage of silicone and cotton. The outer silicone shell is entirely waterproof, with a ridged texture for better grip, while the removable cotton lining makes it comfy to wear and adds extra heat protection for your fingers.
The shape is a bit bulky, though. The long and pointy top half is a little awkward to maneuver and is apt to poke into your baked goods if you grab the pan wrong. However, since the outer shell is entirely silicone, it can just be rinsed in the sink, or even go straight into the dishwasher. The lining is machine-washable, too. The Mastrad is also quite expensive, especially since it includes just one mitt.
Dimensions: 11 x 5.5 x 3.5 inches | Materials: Cotton, silicone | Cleaning: Silicone shell is dishwasher-safe; cotton lining is machine-washable | Maximum Temperature: 572°F
This mitt is extra-long to protect all the way to the elbow, and it offers impressive heat resistance.
The stiff thumb makes it difficult to get a great grip.
Professional bakers like Kareem Queeman of Mr. Bake Sweets in Washington, D.C., spend a lot of time reaching into the oven to insert, remove, and rearrange pans. So heat protection is extra-important. Queeman prefers extra-long silicone mitts, like this Williams Sonoma model that reach to the elbow. "As a baker, it allows me to reach pans that are in the back of the oven without burning my arms, and I can get a good grip on the pans," he says.
The heat resistance on this mitt was impressive in testing: We were able to hold a hot cookie sheet for more than a full minute without much more than a warm sensation. However, the thumb is quite stiff thanks to the silicone coating, which gives you less dexterity. It took a little finagling to get a grip on a shallow baking pan.
Dimensions: 7 x 15 inches | Materials: Cotton, silicone | Machine-Washable: Yes (inside-out only) | Maximum Temperature: 650°F
Food & Wine / Russell Kilgore
Food & Wine / Allison Wignall
Food & Wine / Russell Kilgore
Food & Wine / Russell Kilgore
You can use these inexpensive silicone circles to grab hot pans out of the oven, or to protect tables and countertops.
They're quite small and won't protect your whole hand.
Who doesn't love a multitasker? You can use this round silicone gadget to pull a hot pan out of the oven, and then put another one underneath it on the table for serving. They're cheap enough that you can buy a few to have extras on hand. ThermoWorks really does know temperature: The brand's Thermapen ONE came out on top in our testing of the best instant-read thermometers, and the silicone material in its hot pad can handle up to 600°F. Plus, it can go in the dishwasher for cleanup.
The downside of the hot pad/trivet setup is that the small round shape doesn't do a great job of protecting beyond just the fingers. If you're reaching deep into an oven or to the back of a large grill, you might want a full-on glove that covers your hands.
Dimensions: 7 x 7 inches | Material: Silicone | Dishwasher-Safe: Yes | Maximum Temperature: 600°F
These heavy-duty gloves offer serious heat protection for indoor and outdoor cooking.
The the thick fabric of the fingers interferes with fine control.
You might know Ooni as the brand behind some of the best pizza ovens out there. Its appliances can reach the intense temperatures — 800°F and higher — needed for baking Neapolitan-style pizza, and these gloves are made to handle all that heat with ease. Between the leather exterior and cotton padding on the inside, there's a layer of aluminum insulation that lets them handle up to 950°F. They're one of our favorite grill gloves.
The Ooni gloves passed our tests with flying colors, able to pick up and hold hot grill grates and a preheated cast iron skillet for longer than all but one competitor. The individual fingers give you more dexterity than a mitten-style glove, but the fabric is pretty thick and makes it difficult to grasp thin handles or reach between grates. You also can't do more than spot-clean these gloves: They're not machine-washable, can't be dry-cleaned, and the inside lining can't even get wet. They're intended for outdoor use and might be overkill if you just want gloves for your kitchen oven.
Dimensions: 7 x 14 x 1 inches | Materials: Leather, flannelette, canvas, aluminum | Machine-Washable: No | Maximum Temperature: 950°F
Food & Wine / Jason Horn
Food & Wine / Jason Horn
This compact pot holder is easy pick up, effectively heat-resistant, and can double as a trivet.
The design is better for holding lightweight items than large, heavy ones.
If you have a lot of pots and pans going at the same time, it can be a pain to keep putting on and pulling off a pair of full-on gloves for heat protection. The OXO Good Grips pot holder makes this easier, with a cotton-lined pocket you can slide your fingers in and out of them with ease. The silicone layer on the other side provides solid heat resistance and good grip, and you can also lay it flat on the table or countertop to serve as a protective trivet.
The downside of this pot holder's design is that you have to use the ends of your fingers to hold the weight of the item rather than your whole hand. It can be tough to carry a large stockpot for more than a few seconds.
Dimensions: 9.75 x 7.5 x 0.25 inches | Materials: Silicone and cotton | Machine-Washable: Yes
Food & Wine / Katie McDonald
We loved the Big Red House Heat-Resistant Oven Mitts best because of their high thermal capacity and exceptional grip. If grilling is more your speed, you'll love the Ooni Pizza Gloves, whose heavy-duty insulated leather can handle sky-high temperatures with ease.
Food & Wine / Mary Claire Lagroue
We tested a total of 25 different oven mitts, looking at heat resistance as well as comfort, flexibility, ease of cleaning, and other design aspects. We used each mitt to pick up a hot saucepan from the stove and a hot baking dish from a 450°F oven, holding each for 15 seconds and noting how much heat we could feel in our hands and fingers. After testing was complete. we revealed the retail prices to consider value.
In addition, we performed a separate test on 24 pairs of grill gloves, which can generally handle higher temperatures than indoor oven mitts. We used a similar procedure as we did with oven mitts but picked up a cast iron pan preheated in the oven as well as a hot grill grate. This roundup includes results from both sets of testing.
The classic oven mitt is in the shape of a glove that covers the entire hand and often much of the forearm. This gives you lots of protection against heat but doesn't offer a ton of fine dexterity, especially with a mitten-style glove as opposed to one with individual fingers. You'll have to take the gloves all the way off to switch from carrying a hot pan to holding and stirring a spoon.
A pot holder style oven mitt is more of a simple rectangle or circle shape that you can pick up and put down easily. You'll have to be more careful, however, that unprotected parts of your hand don't touch anything hot. A large pot holder that doesn't closely fit your hand is also more likely to wind up dipping into the food inside a pot or pan — or even catching fire over a stover burner,
Oven mitts are most commonly made of cloth, silicone, or a combination of the two. A thick layer of cotton is good at insulating against heat but makes for a bulky mitt that's not as flexible. Silicone, in contrast, has very low thermal conductivity and will protect from heat with a thin layer. It's also flexible and can easily wrap around whatever you want to grab, but it's naturally smooth in texture and can be slippery when wet or greasy.
Leather is another popular material, especially for heavy-duty mitts than can be used with a grill or other extra-hot open flame. It can stand up to a lot of abuse but it's pricier than other materials.
Make sure you check the maximum temperature your oven mitt is rated to handle before you put it to use. Many mitts designed for indoor use will melt or scorch under the more powerful heat of a grill or pizza oven. A typical indoor oven maxes out at around 500°F, with temperatures that can reach up to 600°F or so under the broiler. On the other hand, a gas grill or wood-fired oven cranked up to maximum can get to well over 900°F. Heavier-duty oven mitts tend to cost more, and they're often thicker and make it more difficult to manipulate objects. If you're a griller and a baker, you might need separate sets for indoor and outdoor use.
Between spills, splashes, and the occasional bit of char and ash, an oven mitt is likely to get pretty messy. Thankfully, most of them are pretty easy to clean. All-fabric ones are usually machine-washable, and all-silicone mitts can often go in the dishwasher. Leather is much more complicated, as it's not usually machine-washable and can only be spot-cleaned or hand-washed. Be sure to read the care instructions for your particular mitt and follow them.
Most professional chefs will say yes, but it's just not the safest option. Thin dish towels can need a few folds to insulate you from the heat, making it difficult to get a good grip. Dangling ends and corners can scorch or catch fire.
But the No. 1 reason why you should avoid using a towel as an oven mitt is steam. If the towel is even the tiniest bit wet, that water can quickly convert into steam and burn you instantly when it touches a hot surface. A steam burn can happen in a flash and is extremely painful. While grabbing the towel you've been drying your hands on or wiping the counter with while cooking may be convenient, in the long run, no amount of convenience is worth the potential for a severe burn. Chef Galen Zamarra of The Lodge at Blue Sky in Park City, Utah, admits to using towels at work, but at home, he says, "I prefer silicone; it is washable with soap and water, doesn't burn like a cloth mitt can, and protects against heat better (even when wet)."
Yes. Silicone kitchen tools are easy to clean, can handle a wide range of temperatures, and don't leach any chemicals into food as long as they're maintained properly. The most important thing is not to heat the silicone above its safe temperature. If the silicone on an oven mitt or any other kitchen tool gets melted or burned, it's a good idea to replace it.
That depends on your specific needs and preferences. The best material for oven mitts is one that is thick enough to insulate your hand from the heat, but not so thick you can't control your grip. Cloth and silicone can both fit the bill. Some mitts have both materials and are the best of both worlds. Chef Trisha Pérez Kennealy, owner of the Inn at Hastings Park in Lexington, Mass., is a fan of this style. "I like to use the oven mitts that have the silicone by the hand and cloth on the bottom," she says. "I find that the silicone is much easier to clean and maintain than washing oven mitts in the washing machine."
Food & Wine / Mary Claire Lagroue
Le Creuset Fingertip Potholders (Amazon)
These teeny pot holders from one of our all-time favorite cookware brands do a great job of insulating from heat, and they're fully machine-washable. But they're too small to lift anything very heavy (like, say, a Le Creuset Dutch oven), and they're awfully expensive.
HOMWE Extra Long Professional Silicone Oven Mitt (Amazon)
This is a quite basic pair of mitts, but it'll do everything oven mitts are supposed to. The silicone layer is a bit thinner than others, which makes them more flexible for an easy grip, but otherwise, they didn't stand out from the pack.
Gorilla Grip Heat Resistant Silicone Oven Mitts (Amazon)
Silicone can get slippery, but that was not a problem with these mitts, thanks to their textured pattern that gives you a great grip. We didn't love the inflexible thumb, though, which makes it tough to pick up and manipulate items.
All-Clad Textiles Silicone Oven Mitt (Amazon)
This fabric-and-silicone mitt performed fine in testing, and we like that it's available in 11 different colors. But the single mitt costs more than many pairs.
All the mitts we tested offered at least a decent amount of insulation, so other design features helped make the difference between top and bottom finishers. Different factors including comfort, shape, and price disappointed us with these.
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