KennethT

I have a flat bottomed wok. It works fine. From what I understand, flat bottomed woks are pretty common throughout Asia, unless you're a restaurant.

This is what I got: It was about $300 on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B016XY88AA/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 There's a lot of inexpensive induction units on Amazon - lots of them with really bad reviews, mostly about longevity. This one seemed to have a better ratio of good/bad reviews. Also, once I get the other, more industrial strength, hob, I won't be using this one as often - it's purpose will be bringing pots of water to a boil and lighter duty stuff that doesn't require much finesse.

The Vollrath I'm looking at supposedly has an expanded magnetic field which allows you to lift the pan while staying within the mag field to replicate cooking on gas. It's commercial equipment which I like. That's not the primary reason why I'm looking at it, but it's certainly a nice feature. The primary reasons are the fine power control with knob, temperature probe which can get it to act like a sous vide setup (even though I already have a few DIY ones that work fine) or make deep frying idiot proof (which I need) and also supposedly one of the most accurate pan temp sensors available, which, if true, would be great for my pressure cooker which I use to make stocks as I constantly had to fiddle with my gas range to get it to stay at a stable pressure - a real pita when doing an hour long stock.

I've really enjoyed using this lately (while only briefly each time): It's a relatively inexpensive induction hob - 3500 Watts!!! It brought about 12 quarts of water to a rolling boil in just under 12 minutes. It doesn't really like it when I lift the pan - it beeps at me when I do so, but at least it doesn't shut off. So far, I've only had time to use it to bring the stockpot to a boil (as a test) and to stir fry a few veggies in my carbon steel wok, which was an absolute pleasure - so much easier than when I used to use my crappy underpowered gas stove. One of the things that makes it inexpensive is that you can only choose from about 10 power levels, which has been fine so far for what I've been doing. Sometime soon in the future I'm going to get a Vollrath induction unit (I'm thinking the 2600W since so far I haven't had the need to use this one at 3500W except to boil water - the stir fries haven't gone over 2400W and even that is crazy hot) which you can control the output power in 1% increments, from 0 to 100% and also, rather than cycling the power on and off for the power level, it adjusts the power intensity. Plus, to control the power there is a knob rather than push buttons... but that's for another post.

I've had some birds in SE Asia that could have used a long braise - one in particular was in Indonesia, a kampung chicken (considered a delicacy) - which is basically a yardbird that eats all sorts of grubs and whatever else chickens love to eat, all while seemingly running a marathon every other day. I don't think it was actually that old, but it had tons of flavor, and was quite tough - especially the joints. I couldn't cut through the leg/thigh joint with whatever utensil I could find.

Is it really a braise? No, probably not to the classical definition, but I just called it that because it is meat cooking half in/half out of liquid in a covered pot, so what else would you call it? Simmered chicken half in/half out of liquid in a covered pot is quite a mouthful. Then again, do you really have to braise chicken thighs? Or any piece of chicken that isn't the gizzard or something?

OK - I guess I wasn't clear for what I do though... my braise in the tamarind liquid would be for about 15 minutes tops... I don't know if I'd do a 2 hour braise in the seasoned wok, but most Asian wok braising doesn't take that long. I'm going to attempt it teh next time I make that dish... I'll report back my findings.

Related to our discussion in the wok-cooking thread, how do you cook the orzo? Do you just use a pot on another burner? Also, how many burners (hobs) do normal Chinese kitchen have? I'd think there would be only 1 since everything is usually cooked in the wok anyway...

Interesting.... I guess it doesn't really matter - especially since you don't use that much water anyway, and the wok is already hot - you rinse with hot water regardless of the initial water temp!

Main vessel... or only! But the good thing about the wok is that it cleans fast (just a quick rinse in hot water) and the stir fried veg cook super fast, so you can plate your braised dish (typically family style), clean the wok and cook the veg and the braised dish will have barely cooled down. That's my experience anyway..

Thanks. I'll try it one day and think of you, whether the results are good or bad.... hehe 🤣

One question for wok users about braising things - one of the curries I make has tamarind in it, which is acidic. I'm concerned about cooking this dish in my well seasoned carbon steel wok because I'm nervous that the acid will break down my seasoning and A) make me have to reseason every time I make that dish and B) will taint my curry with dissolved seasoning! Are my concerns unfounded?

My recently purchased wok came with a solid aluminum lid with wooden knob... not that I've used the cover yet... lately, anything that needs steaming gets done in the CSO

@liuzhou What is the difference between cooking and eating chopsticks? I assume they're longer - but a different material? What about tongs?

Tangled up in blue is one of my favorites of his...

Yeah, I'm pretty happy with the electric service, but it would have to be pretty beefy to get away with having no gas service. Our building is a 100 year old industrial building - it used to be a tailoring company. It was converted to coop residential units in the late 70s/early 80s. So I imagine that the building already had a powerful main feed to run the industrial sewing machines,etc. Hot water, heat and A/C is included in our maintenance (which is pretty low) - each apartment has a fan coil unit that takes heated/chilled water from the roof - although I gather they'll be changing over to a heat pump system soon. Before I demo'd it, the apartment had a 20 year old electric coil top range. When I was growing up, my parents had a coil top electric range and I hated cooking on it, so I was really happy to get that thing out of there - I wound up giving it to one of the maintenance guys who wanted it along with all of the kitchen cabinets.

Deep fried with salt, they're not too bad, but I wasn't a huge fan of the aftertaste

Hilarious... I just wish there were photos!

My building has no gas service, so everything is electric. A standard US electric oven uses both 240V (for the heating elements) and 120V (for the controls/convection fan, etc). I decided not to get a standard US oven, which typically utilizes a 240V 40 or 50A circuit breaker (I use my CSO - there's only 2 of us - the amount of times I really need a full size oven I can count on one hand, especially since we're no longer having big parties and I'm cooking for liek 12 people at once or apps for 40) - so, instead, I had them install a 240V 30A breaker that just feeds a duplex 240V outlet (with 6-20R receptacles) which I will use for 2 240V induction burners. I got one 3500W cheap one - great for bringing a pot of water to boil, etc. and I'm going to get a Vollrath 2600W fancy induction unit which you can vary the power level in 1% increments or use temp mode and set a temp - it has both a pan sensor (supposedly the most accurate in the industry) and also a liquid probe which will be great for deep frying. it's like a control freak but 1/2 the price. They make it in 3500 and 4600W power levels, but I don't think it's necessary to have 2 super high power ones. I think the 2600W one will still be more powerful than the gas burner in my old apartment. Finally, I got a 15,000BTU butane burner (liek what she uses on hot thai kitchen) and I've used it a couple times - it was great for stir frying in the wok (albeit a little light, so it wants to move around a bit) but was almost too powerful for simmering a curry - in fact, I haven't taken it past 1/2 power yet because it makes so much heat, the sauce splatters all over.

for my mise, I usually put separate piles on a small plate, then use the sled to push each pile into the wok as needed. BTW, speaking of wok, I just got a relatively inexpensive 240V 3500W induction hob. It's not that controllable, but from the little I've used it so far (I've stir fried some morning glory and some bok choy), it's great with my carbon steel wok. I can get a great sear and char on things, then turn it down so it doesn't light the whole place on fire....

@liuzhouI am sorry to hear this, but I am glad you got to see her relatively recently. Like others, I really enjoyed reading about your trip and loved seeing the look on your mother's face when she first saw you.

I use the wok sled all the time. I can't read all of your hieroglyphics, but the middle says Hong Kong.

I used an angle grinder with a 1/16" metal cutting blade. It cut like butter. Then I rounded off the edges using my grinding wheel and wire brush.

Wow... looks great. What is at the bottom of the first pic? Are they mantis shrimp? We had them once in Hong Kong and were very disappointed - hard to peel and not much meat for all the work - but they also might not have been prepared very well.... Also, that's a very interesting example of seafood in the middle... I guess floating on top of the water counts? haha...

It looks to me like a red wax ginger. I think this is one that I saw in the Singapore Botanic Gardens years ago (2012): I always loved the ginger family, but as gorgeous as some of the inflorescences (is that a word?) are, the edible gingers are very plain looking - with the exception of the torch ginger...