heated empty non-stick pot on stove by mistake...should I be worried?

[laurajetter]

Okay, this is really weird how this happened, but I set the smoke alarm off this morning because I was heating a non-stick pot on high heat for a few minutes without any water in it.

Without boring you with the details, suffice it to say there was a large covered pot on the stove this morning which to my knowledge had water in it from last night, which I now wanted to boil. Apparently, my husband boiled the water this morning while I was still sleeping, emptied the pot, replaced the lid, and put the pot back exactly where it was. He forgot to tell me this, so I get up and put our gas burner on high to heat up what was now an empty pot.

Several minutes later, the smoke alarm goes off, completely startling me because I could see the pot of 'water', and it looked fine, so I was afraid the alarm was for something else. I first turned off the burner then got the alarm to go off. I removed the lid and that's when I saw there was no water! What I thought was steam escaping was actually smoke.

I have a few questions about this that I hope someone might be able to answer.

1. I've heard a few negative things regarding non-stick coating being dangerous if it chips off. Do you think the integrity of the pot has been compromised because of this incident? As soon as I removed the pot I could hear faint clicking/popping sounds. If this were any old pot I'd get rid of it, but it has a wonderful strainer lid that I use with it for pasta all the time.

2. If there is truth in the danger of non-stick coating, then would having it on high heat cause there to be dangerous fumes which I inhaled after the incident? (I remaining nearby in the living room for quite a while afterwards.)

3. What was causing the smoke? At first I thought maybe slight food residue, but it was clean and I couldn't imagine a small amount of residue causing a continual flow of smoke.

Any advice would be appreciated!

 

[toocooltobeMom]

I did this a few times in the past. One time the pot melted thru. Oops. I will definitely trash the pot if the non-stick coating has been compromised (flaking off) There was an article a while back about the non-stick coating being a health hazard? I forgot where/who wrote that but since then I have switched to stainless steel exclusively. And I only buy tea kettle w/whistle too.

 

[SamIAm21]

The only danger would be to very small children and small animals. Overheated Teflon will kill a guinea pig, bird, and other smaller pets that may be in any area within 10 to 20 feet of the kitchen stove. I have a parrot and we no longer use Teflon or non-stick coated pans.