CaliWoods · Journal
A US lab tested baking paper and found a forever chemical in two rolls
Think baking paper is just paper, so any roll off the shelf does the same job? A US lab tested eight parchment paper brands and found a forever-chemical marker in two of them — 20% off the mat with code BAKEMAT20
Try the Circular Baking Mat →The question
Is every roll of baking paper actually the same?
Grab any roll of baking paper off the supermarket shelf and it looks the same as the next one. White or brown, thin, a little shiny. Nothing on the front tells you what actually makes it non-stick.
That is not something most people think to check. Baking paper has been in kitchens for generations, and nobody reads the fine print on a roll of paper the way they would a food label. Most rolls do not have one to read.
What actually makes baking paper non-stick
- A silicone coating, which is inert and considered safe
- Or a fluorochemical coating, the same chemical family used to make packaging grease-proof
- Nothing on most rolls tells you which one you are holding
The test
What the lab found when it tested eight brands
In 2024, the consumer testing group Mamavation sent eight popular parchment paper brands to an EPA-certified lab and tested them for fluorine, the marker chemists use to check for PFAS, the forever chemicals linked to a long list of health concerns because they do not break down in the body or the environment.
Two of the eight brands came back with detectable fluorine, at 12 and 14 parts per million (Mamavation lab testing of parchment paper brands). The other six, all using a silicone coating, showed no detectable fluorine at all.
That was a US test of US supermarket brands, not a New Zealand study, and it does not mean every roll on a shelf here has the same result. What it shows is that the coating on baking paper is not one fixed ingredient. It is a choice a manufacturer makes, and two brands out of eight on that particular test made the one worth avoiding.
No coating to wonder about.
See what a mat with no coating question at all looks like →The swap
One silicone mat skips the guessing game entirely
That is the exact gap a reusable silicone baking mat closes. The CaliWoods Circular Baking Mat is made from food-grade silicone certified to the European LFGB standard, tested stricter than the FDA equivalent, and it is BPA-free. There is no coating to identify, because the mat itself is the cooking surface.
What one pack actually gives you
- Two mats, 20cm and 25cm, sized to fit the most common circular cake tins, so no cutting paper to shape
- Dishwasher safe and freezer safe
- A roll of baking paper needs replacing every bake. One mat does not
- Each mat keeps roughly 350 sheets of disposable baking paper out of landfill over its life (CaliWoods' own estimate)
Two mats, no more cutting circles.
Check the baking mat →Save this one
The habit that matters more than the mat
Whatever you bake on, let it cool before you stack or wash it, and skip the metal scraper on silicone since a sharp edge can nick the surface over years of use. A soft sponge and warm water is all it needs.
A silicone mat will not brown a base the exact same way bare metal does, so for very crisp bakes like biscuits, some bakers still reach for paper on that one job. For roasting, tray bakes and most everyday baking, the mat does what baking paper does, without a new roll every week.
A cooking surface with nothing to decode
20% off the Circular Baking Mat · code BAKEMAT20
Get the Circular Baking MatThe Mamavation testing covered eight US parchment paper brands in 2024 and measured total fluorine as a marker for PFAS. It did not test New Zealand brands. The 350-sheet figure is CaliWoods' own estimate.
