This $14.99 ALDI Find Is Essential for Thanksgiving

Why pay more for a fancy pan you'll only use occasionally?

A roasting pan is a kitchen essential. These large, straight sided pans aren’t just good for your annual turkey and holiday roasts. You can use a roasting pan for making large batches of snack mix, for water bath baking (like cheesecake and crème brûlee), for braising short ribs and steaming pork ribs.

Just because you need a roasting pan, you don’t have to spend a lot of money on a pan you’ll only use occasionally. Enter ALDI's Crofton Roasting Pan with Rack, priced at just $14.99.

As the resident turkey roaster in my family, I have used many roasting pans—some good and some really bad. The cheap disposable aluminum roasting pans make pulling a 10-plus-pound turkey out of the oven feel like risking your life. There are also the spendy stainless steel roasters that, while sturdy, will take you the better part of a day to scrub clean.

Why I Love ALDI's Crofton Roasting Pan

What I love so much about this affordable roaster from ALDI is that it is inexpensive enough to leave at your holiday AirBnB, strong enough to be safely carried around the kitchen, and it has a nonstick coating that makes it easy to clean.

While I haven’t tested roasting turkey in it yet, I have meal-prepped two roast chickens and vegetables in one oven session and baked a giant batch of snack mix to take to a holiday happy hour. Roasting the chickens was incredibly easy—thanks to the roasting rack, I was able to set the two chickens side by side in the pan and layer sweet potatoes, Brussels sprouts, and apples below them.

The veggies roasted evenly, there were no uneven hot spots like you get with disposable aluminum, and I could clean both the pan and the rack without soaking. When it came to the snack mix, the roasting pan was large enough to act as a mixing bowl, and its depth made turning over all the cereal and pretzels in the oven less messy. I feel confident enough in the even heating abilities of this roasting pan to try a cheesecake in it next.

This roasting pan is so versatile and easy to clean that I am considering buying a few to keep at my in-laws' houses, so I’ll never be without one when I visit and inevitably get put in charge of the turkey or holiday roast!

About ALDI Finds

This product is an ALDI Find, which are limited-time and inventory items that the store rotates onto its shelves every week. They come and go quickly—and sometimes return. Keep an eye out, but it's possible your local ALDI may have sold out or no longer carry the product.