I would season it for the following reasons: seasoning might help prevent sugar crystals from sticking to the sides of the interior; would probably help prevent the candy from sticking to the interior when it comes time to push it out of the pot, & you might prevent a metallic taste in your candy.

Old fashioned sugar kettles, now used primarily for landscaping, were made of cast iron.

Thanks for the advice. I guess rusty candy would be bad. Now I just need perfect weather to run the oven with windows open. Not too hot, not too cold....running out of time!

Wish I could join you. Candy making is such fun!

Now that all kinds of snacks & junk food are being fortified with "nutrients," you can claim your candy has iron it :)

Iron fortified fudge! I don't feel experimental enough to try cheddar cheese fudge to also get all the protein and calcium in it, though.

Weather is nice enough to have all the windows open so I'm seasoning the pot. Hope the little batch of rust on the bottom won't be a problem. The sides are still like satin, fortunately.

fori, if you haven't already started seasoning your pot....I would suggest that you remove that surface rust (both inside and outside of pot) using Bar Keepers Friend with a good scrub brush. Do the same with your lid. This won't hurt your pot. It will easily remove any surface rust and give you a much cleaner surface for the seasoning to adhere.

Dan

Too late! It was just a little spot...odds are good I'll let something bad happen and have to reseason it at which time I'll do it properly. The inside had come very clean from the EZoff treatment.

Anyway, great candy pot! And induction is absolutely wonderful for candymaking. One more reason to switch to gas...I can't be making candy whenever I feel like it!

fori, what do you plan to make? (mouth watering as I type)

Ooooh, you have an induction cooktop? A fabulous antique cast-iron pot & an induction cooktop sounds like cook's heaven to me :)

Hope you'll treat us with pictures of your candy making efforts!

Yesterday we did toffee and an easy fudge (rolling boil six minutes instead of thermometer watching)...today we'll try penuche which is a more hardcore-no-shortcuts recipe and will be the real test. Overall, I think this will be a very fattening combination.

I am not overly fond of the induction and intend to replace it when we redo the kitchen, but it really does shine when you need precise control of stuff. Or when you leave the room and things boil over and you have to clean it, which is really more often the case for me!

The pot is pretty gross-looking by modern standards so I plan to use it cauldron-style to serve the candy at a Halloween get-together (yeah, I'll be a witch). If I remember I'll take a picture!