Good Question: How to Clean Rusty Dansk Cookware

I have a full set of the Dansk (DANSK IHC KOBENWARE on bottoms) Kobenstyle cookware in navy blue and white that has served me well, but the bottoms of all of the pots and pans have rusted and leave rust rings in my sink if I don't clean them immediately. How do I safely remove the rust and somehow seal the bottoms so that they do not continue to rust in the future?

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We love Dansk Kobenstyle pots and pans; you can't beat that classic look and punchy color. You can see our guide to Kobenstyle cookware here.

Dansk Kobenstyle is lighter than cast iron; it's made of sheet steel and covered with enamel. As far as cleaning goes, check out this post: Good Question: How Do I Clean My Vintage Kettle?

But the rust problem makes it sound like the enamel has worn through on the bottoms and the metal is peeking through. Short of re-enameling, which we do not know much about, we think that there is not a lot of help for this. Try cleaning and drying immediately after use to prevent rust.

Readers - what do you think? Have you ever been able to re-seal a rusty pan?

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Comments (2)

i haven't tried this, but... i'd get the rust off with steel wool, clean and dry thoroughly, then put oil on the places without enamel and season those places like a cast iron pan. (disable the smoke alarm first, if you live your hearing.) repeat.

you'd probably end up getting some oil on the enamel part, too, which you could carefully clean off or just live with. and you might have to avoid leaving it in the sink anyway, as the seasoning can wear off easily that way.

posted by SweetTea on April 11th 2008 at 6:53am
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Having dealt with all kinds of vintage cookware I would suggest like the above commenter that you clean the rust off with fine (00 or 000) steel wool, this shouldn't affect the enamel very much. You can also use Bar Keeper's Friend, or CLR (Calcium Lime Rust remover-available at hardware stores)
Then treat with vegetable oil, or rub it with crisco while it's hot, much as you would season cast iron pans.
do this a few times, and it should keep the rust at bay.
I second that leaving it in the sink will only cause more rust, water is after all the enemy of raw steel and iron.
I don't know of any re-enameling that you could do at home that would hold up and be heat/food safe.

posted by thebkk on April 11th 2008 at 6:44pm
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