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For me, the minimum diameter for a wok should be 14". barely big enough to stir fry for two. Especially if it is flat bottom. less than 14" it is just a deep skillet. I prefer a 16" wok. dcarch

Ah, reminds me of De Buyer by the looks. Also made in France. https://www.debuyer.com/en/products/induction-hob-special-stainless-steel-wok-stainless-steel-tube-handle https://www.francecorner.com/cook/2018-de-buyer-affinity-wok.html This one is less pricey, comes with lid and wok spatula: https://www.amazon.com/Souped-Up-Recipes-Induction-Seasoning/dp/B07RJ39JVL You may find this more recent article of interest: https://theequippedcook.com/induction-wok/

There's no need to use an oven to make crispy, chip like chicken skin. A little peanut oil or rice bran oil (or your favorite frying oil) in the bottom of a wok will do the trick. Dry the chicken skin, lightly fry util crisp, sprinkle with salt and MSG. DELISH and oven free.

There's no need to use an oven to make crispy, chip like chicken skin. A little peanut oil or rice bran oil (or your favorite frying oil) in the bottom of a wok will do the trick. Dry the chicken skin, lightly fry util crisp, sprinkle with salt and MSG. DELISH and oven free.

Is it? Not in many Chinese kitchens. Most people don't have the equipment. You can't cook a whole, submerged chicken in a domestic wok, which is all many homes have. A wok and a rice cooker is all most people have. I don't have a pan large enough and I'm not going to buy one just for something I might cook once a year. Especially when I can buy the dish so easily, if I choose. But if I did buy a suitable pan, where would I keep it? Chinese home kitchens tend to be smaller than what you may be used to. Also. it uses a lot of water. Once to cover the chicken to poach, then for the ice bath which also has to cover the bird. Where do I get that much ice? I'm not saying no one makes it, but few do. I don't think any of my friends do.

Last night was a stir fry to use aging occupants of the vegetable drawer. Broccoli, carrots, tofu, a shallot. I tossed the tofu cubes with some hoisin as they browned in the wok, which added nice color. A bit of bottled peanut/coconut sauce added near the end. Served with brown rice.

Ladies and gentlemen, ... It arrived! I ended my last post reflecting on all the effort it took to find this book. I acknowledged that in all likelihood, this book would not be worth the work. I'm happy to say I was wrong. This book is a wonderful find, and I hope all of you get the chance to enjoy it one day. The most interesting part of all is this the recipe layout. I've never seen such cleanly outlined recipes. For the sake of an example, here's the Mapo Tofu recipe from the book. As the colloquial Sichuan dish in the West, it should be a good point of reference for many that read this post. Here's a transcription - Ingredients 300g tofu, 60g stir-fried beef mince, 20g baby leeks (chopped into sections), 80g cooking oil Seasonings A 25g Pixian chili bean paste, 10g ground chilies, 6g fermented soy beans Seasonings B 3g salt, 5g soy sauce, 1g MSG Seasonings C 1g ground roasted Sichuan pepper, 200g everyday stock, 30g cornstarch-water mixture Preparation 1, Cut the tofu into 1.8cm3 cubes, blanch in salty water, remove and soak in water. 2. Heat oil in a wok to 120°C, add Seasonings A and stir-fry to bring out the aroma. Add the stock, fried beef mince, season with Seasoning B, and simmer for 2 to 3 minutes; add the leeks and thicken with cornstarch-water mixture; Transfer to a serving bowl and sprinkle with Seasoning C. So a lot to go through here. I'm going to split up my comments and critiques into two categories. One that critiques the recipe and one that critiques the recipe layout/choices. Comments on the recipe Beef Everything about the beef was a little strange in this dish. They called for the beef pre-cooked and didn't go over the cooking step at all. While this would normally be fine all though a little strange, in mapo tofu, it's bad. The whole point of the beef is to use the fried beef oil as the base for the dish. The mince itself is tertiary. Because the recipe never outlined cooking the beef, the average home cook would most likely not realize that they needed to save the oil for cooking the Pixian bean paste. Aromatics The first thing I noticed when I read this recipe was that it had no aromatics besides the Sichuan pepper powder if you count that. No garlic. Not even the white portion of the green onion. This struck me as strange till I looked a little deeper at what the hell "baby leeks" are in this context. Welcome to the wacky world of obscure vegetables and aromatics. Where scientific names are never listed, and regional names differ wildly. Were they calling for Dacong, aka welsh onion (Allium Fistolum)? It's very often used across Northern China Is it talking about actual leeks (Allium ampeloprasum)? Or perhaps it meant Chinese chives, aka garlic chives (Allium tuberosum). No, this has nothing to do with garlic, garlic scapes, or green garlic besides the fact that its an allium. Speaking of garlic, it could be green garlic; immature garlic pulled before the bulb has matured (Allium sativum). It looks quite like a large scallion. Possibly it's garlic scapes, the immature flower stalks of garlic (Allium sativum). They're often removed by farmers to focus all the garlic's energy into bulb growth. Because of this, they're plentiful and cheap across China. I can come up with at least five more, but I think you get the point The characters listed for it are "蒜苗节20克". From my limited google skills, I've come to the conclusion that they're suanmiao, aka green garlic. A good sub if you can't find any in your area is... well... garlic. I'd add it right after you finish frying seasonings A but before you add the stock. 10-15 seconds should be enough time for it to cook. While you'll miss a lot of the pleasent textural aspects, and the garlic flavor will be more homogeneous in the dish, it should work pretty well as far as subs go. If you take anything away from this, know that dacong are not leeks, no matter how often they're translated as leeks in the West. They both taste similar, but dacong is tender and soft while leek can be tough and crunchy. Dacong closer to a scallion than an onion in flavor, unlike leek. Also, Chinese leek can refer to dacong, leeks, and Chinese Chives - so be careful with that term. This is why sources like liuzhou's Chinese Vegetables Illustrated thread are so important. So after that detour, back to the recipe. Critiques of the recipe layout and recipe choices Seasoning categories The seasonings categories are a brilliant idea. It's the linchpin of what makes these recipes so concise and neat. It makes perfect sense when you think of most wok cooking. A basic fried rice or stir-fry are cooked very fast. The timing between adding different types of ingredients is crucial and can be a surprisingly narrow range. Take a look at this basic gailan stir-fry. I've listed estimated cooking times for each step. Quick fry of the beef and remove ~45 seconds Fry the garlic and ginger~ 10seconds Throw in onion and chili ~30 seconds Splash of Shaoxing wine Toss in the (mostly) cooked beef ~15 seconds Add soy sauce Quick mix ~10 seconds Add cornstarch slurry Quick mix ~10 seconds Add blanched gailan Quick mix ~10 seconds Drizzle with some toasted sesame oil You can see that once you start, it's a very fast process. This leaves the cook with very little time to fiddle with their recipe books and even less time to deliberate over what to do. Compare that to this version of the recipe, which consolidates each ingredient type into categories. Ingredients - Beef slivers, blanched gailan Seasonings A - ginger, garlic seasonings B - onion, chili Seasonings C - soy sauce, cornstarch slurry Quick fry of the beef and remove ~45 seconds Fry the seasonings A ~10seconds Throw in seasonings B ~30 seconds Splash of Shaoxing wine Toss in the (mostly) cooked beef ~15 seconds Add Seasoning C Quick mix ~10 seconds Add blanched gailan Quick mix ~10 seconds Drizzle with some toasted sesame oil While it may arguable be a longer recipe, it feels neater. It takes steps away from the frantic parts of the cooking process and places them at the start, where you have all the time in the world. It forces the cook to create a form of mise en place. Of course, a good cook can use both recipes perfectly well and make great food. But to someone like me, who does not prepare well enough ahead of time while cooking, the second recipe is inarguable better. While the idea may be brilliant, the execution is less than perfect. For example, 2 out of three of the ingredients in seasonings C are used before seasonings C is called for. There is no need for a whole category when you're just going to list for the ingredients individually anyway. Measurements As you can see, the measurements are all given in grams. I can't count how many cups vs. grams arguments I've read on forums, but I can tell you this is the first truly grams only cookbook I own. Instead of a teaspoon, it calls for things down to a single gram's worth. I'm not sure how I feel about this. I greatly prefer grams to cups, but for sums smaller than 5 grams~ volume just seems better. I'm willing to be wrong, though, and I'm excited to try this book out. I might need to get a scale with better resolution. Conclusion I'm very excited to use this book more. I showed the mapo tofu recipe as a point of refrenece for everyone, but this book has much more to it than just mapo tofu. There are so many interesting recipes that I'm excited to try. I'll update this thread if I make anything else fro the book.

Totally indulgent wok of "greasy noodles" = ham, green onion, yellow onion, noodles, soy. Kiss of Sriracha. Two bowls. Stuffed but happy..

I don't strain mine, though I tend to only save grease from bacon I cook for eating in slices. That is most often made in the oven, which produces a lot fewer "bits." In terms of how long it keeps, I tend to have two jars in the fridge, one marked "fill" and one marked "use up." New grease goes into the "fill" jar. When the "use up" jar is depleted, its lid goes on the "fill" jar, and the "fill" lid goes on a clean, empty jar. One use case not mentioned upthread -- certain stir fries. Fuchsia Dunlop mentions here and there that lard was very traditionally used for stir-frying in many Chinese recipes -- and given the difficulty in getting "wok hei" on my radiant electric stove, I find the smokiness of the bacon fat to be a nice reinforcement.

Some while ago I stumbled on Vivek Singh's cooking in The Guardian. I was so pleased with the results I bought a copy of his Curry Classic and Contemporary. Now the reviews of Curry are not all positive. Unobtainable ingredients and impossible restaurant recipes. That being said it is a beautiful, well written and well illustrated cookbook. Only one or two dishes did not appeal. I'm looking at you, liver. And there is something to offend almost anyone: beef, lamb, pork, goat, camel, seafood, corn, and little green peas. Tonight's dinner was kadhai ka shikar, mixed game cooked in an Indian wok (pp 170-171). Now, I have a kadhai but it became apparent the ingredients would not fit, so I employed my Japanese cast iron Chinese cooking vessel. Singh explains: Shikar is a Hindi term for hunted meat, and this kadhai-style preparation is a quick and easy way to enjoy whatever you may be able to lay your hands upon." I'm not sure about the quick and easy part but what I was able to lay my hands upon was a Shoprite chicken breast. The recipe calls for grouse, partridge, quail, and pheasant. I would not go so far as to say the recipe was easy. Some spices such as cumin, fennel, coriander are used multiple ways and added at different times. It did not help that after I toasted the spice mix I cross threaded the lid of my spice mill such that I cannot get it on or off. After toasting another quantity of spices I learned my lesson and ground them in a mortar. Similarly, any well appointed spice shelf will have carom seeds. I just had never had an opportunity to use them. And then there were the dried red chillies. The recipe calls for five. I grew them. I know them. I looked at them. They looked at me. I used three. Note there is no lack of other fresh and powdered peppers in the dish. They did not feel lonely. Once everything is prepared the dish comes together quickly. One of the finer bits of cookery I have enjoyed of any cuisine. I've had nothing to compare in any Indian restaurant. And five red chillies would not have been too many.

Lettuce wraps with bok choy.. The protein was skirt steak and a pork chop.. Trying to make my way through the inventory... I think today is the last day before it all goes into the deep freeze.... Simple marinade of brown sugar, soy, chinese bbq sauce and fish sauce. Pickled sichuan vegetables i had in a jar... I also may rice. Bok choy was from the farmers market.. I was going to steam in a wok with garlic and then add an oyster sauce.. But, out of oyster sauce so, made a vinegar, tahini, soy ginger thing.. But, yeh, cooked in a bit of oil and maybe 4 cloves of garlic, then hit with some water and covered... Cooked a little longer and then sauce on the platter. It was good.. I also made some white rice.. really simple, some oil, garlic, ginger, for like 15 minutes.. Got rid of bok choy, lettuce, a pork chop, some skirt steak... Really blah, freaking boring day... Oh well. One day closer to see my kids.

Re boiling water for pasta. You don't need heat two gallons for a few servings of noodles, a couple quarts is usually enough. The traditional advice to use mass quantities of water is just wrong. Accomplishes nothing. The pasta doesn't know how much water is in the pot. And the big pot wastes fuel, salt and water. So if you need a wok burner only to boil water...

I don't own a blue star, but I have a GE with one larger burner, about 21k and it does come in useful for boiling water for pasta and wok cooking. That said, I looked into various options like a 3/4 inch gas pipe and a professional range before coming to the conclusion I was being a bit crazy. The reason I am posting is to caution you about going around manufacturers guidelines to save a few bucks. Part of what talked me out of the professional stove was looking into various fire codes and ordinances. When you start to tinker with a range you at a minimum void any warranty, you may also void your home owners insurance if you have a fire. I would proceed with caution.

As the wonderful cook @liuzhou has mentioned elsewhere, when the question was about home wok burners, basically no one in China has a burner anywhere near the equivalent of a wok burner in their home. How much time (provided you don't burn the shit out of it, or evaporate it completely) is someone saving making a pan sauce because she has a 22K BTU burner on her stove? You're not in a restaurant kitchen; you're home, where cooking ought be pleasurable, not performed as if you're in the weeds. And yes, I've worked in a restaurant kitchen. Personally, a 24" fridge would drive me crazy; in our tiny NYC apartment, I was very adamant with our architect about wanting a 33" full depth fridge, and got one.

Thanks for all the responses. Some good questions here. Incinerating a cow? I might need a bigger hood over the range. How often do we wok? If we had the heat output we might a little bit more. I've been doing the majority of the renovations on the house myself. We've gone low cost in some areas with the expectation that we could put those savings into some upgrades. Lower cost: Ikea kitchen cabinets, bathroom cabinets (got creative there), bathroom sink. "Splurged" on some Ikea undercounted lighting, wifi enabled. Local builders store shower pan and surround, Did the plumbing modifications myself, with the exception of the gas line extension (safety). Haggled for best deals on the other appliances, did pretty well there. Lots of painting, interior renovations, etc. Possibilities of a large deck that'll hang off the back of the house, maybe 300sqft. All said lots of changes, but not so much money involved. That said, there are $$$ in the bucket for the range that I'd like to have in the house. It'll (hopefully) be my last one. If you've ever worked in a well equipped restaurant kitchen you'll understand that the power burners are the ones most used. Makes fast and easy work of cooking, with all of the adjustments you need. I'm thinking I could be happy with the base RCS, 15k burners. Going down the rabbit hole of mumkin's links it looks like with a little bit of chicanery and a couple of hundred dollars I could save eight hundred and have higher output. Still looking for input....I've not placed the order as yet. Thanks all.

Ignoring brands, I sear in cast iron pans on my 16k burner very successfully. I'm curious if to know you use a wok often enough to need the 22k?

I have a Blue Star 6 burner in the lowest price grade..culinary, I think. I love it. Puts out a ton of heat. A wok ring would intensify the already hot burners. The broiler is nuclear powered hot. My only complaint is that the simmer is too high, even on the simmer burner. I need a eat diffuser and even then its a little hotter than I want. Overall I love it

Long time lurker here, have made a few posts also. Looking for info, but most of all guidance. I've been doing a remodel on a 1950's ranch here in the NorthEast. We've owned the house for almost 30 years, paid off in full, looking now to return to it and "retire". Doing most of the work myself, but just had the electrician in to update some wiring, especially the kitchen and bathroom. Recent visit from the plumber to extend the natural gas line to the kitchen. We've purchased most of the appliances already, mainly Bosch. 24" fridge, 24" stacking washer/dryer, 24" dishwasher. Higher end JennAir hood over the range. There'll only be two of us living there (one if I don't get this project done soon....). I've decided on BlueStar for the range. We'll need to stay in the 30" size. Their 2 offerings I've been contemplating are the Culinary series and the RNB. I'm former restaurant worker, and like the simplicity of the open burner and the lack of touch screen controls. Culinary = ~$4k RNB = ~$5k Biggest difference between the two are (Culinary) three 15,000BTU burners vs (RNB) two 15,000BTU burners and one 22,000BTU burner. Both models have the "precise simmer" burner. Does the one burner with extra BTUs = $1k? I'm leaning to the RNB...higher temp for a wok, searing on iron, etc. My wife thinks I'm crazy, but she's on board with whatever we end up with. I'll still be running a fridge in the basement, also will have a "rental house grade" electric range available there. We do a lot of outside cooking, it's a walkout basement, these appliances will be for convenience and the occasional bake where electric would be preferred over gas. What say the experts? Attachment gives the features between the RCS (Culinary line) and the RNB. Open Burner Gas Ranges and Stoves | Commercial Quality Ranges | BlueStar.pdf

I have a decent home stove and good ventilation, but for stir frying I still use the Big Kahuna outdoor propane burner I received as a gift about (wow...) a decade ago. I don't see how it could be adapted easily to a disposable propane tank, though. I think it's something like 60,000 BTU, which has been fine for my purposes. My meals are typically rice+cold veg+stir fry, and are for two people, so it's plenty spacious. (FYI I don't use the wok that came with the kit, I picked up an el cheapo carbon steel model with a single handle at my local Asian megamart. I prefer to physically toss the wok, rather than just use utensils, and the wok the Kahuna came with was absurdly large.)

To answer my own question, the folks who do the Chinese Cooking Demystified youtube videos use exactly what I'd originally suggested - a small Iwatani butane burner good for about 10,000BTU. I've been eyeballing a 110,000BTU jet burner that's $40 online. I live in a tiny 1-room apartment, but it's on the ground floor, so cooking outside is appealing. Cooking for multiple people is a bit tricky with a small wok because either (a) you let everything get cold or (b) everyone eats without you, and there's the added substantial benefit of being able to deep-fry a ton of food. That said, I'd probably avoid it without one of the gas flow pedals used in Chinese restaurants. Imagine driving your car if you had to take your hand off the wheel to work the gas pedal? (Also, the steering wheel weighs fifteen pounds and is on fire.) My stove is a cheapo compact apartment special, good for maybe 6,000BTU. To put this in perspective, the nicer butane hotplates are good for 15,000. It boils water slower than something I used to make coffee on picnics. That said, a burner-focusing ring like the Wokmon sounds like a good idea, especially considering they're demonstrating it on a butane hotplate. I don't have typical equipment; I have a stove that can barely boil water and an oven with no numbers on the dial. The $40 butane burner is a massive improvement.

I have nothing to offer in terms of equipment but do agree w the others. Unless it's for professional use the blasters don't seem worth it esp when you factor the danger. I have a Thermador 6 burner (propane) that puts out prob a bit more btu's then the avg burner. It's plenty for home use. I found varying results came down to the quality of the wok. A good one will allow for better heat distribution and retention. With accurate ingredient timing we can get close to resto qlty stir fries (at least we think:) I have a circulon 14' I got at Macy's a few yrs ago for about $70 and it's light years better than the thin metal cheapos we had. Gd luck and hope you find what you want. Btw, hello all, it's been about 10yrs since my last post.

Grace Young has written wonderful cookbooks describing how to stir fry at home with typical equipment. In general she advises using a flat bottom high carbon steel wok. After that it's about limiting the amount of food that goes in a one time and technique. Stirring at the right time and leaving to sear at the right time. Also learning velveting is handy.

It looks like you've been doing research, so I'm sure you've come across the outdoor propane wok burners. They have upwards or exceed 100k btu, usually don't come with a stand. If you have any asian-centric areas like a chinatown or japantown nearby, go browse stores after the shut-ins are lifted and you'll find one, and can even haggle if that's your thing. On line they seem to have gone up in price compared to 10 years ago. I picked mine up in "Little Saigon" near my old house, haggled price down because of the rat poop in the box. Given that, please take a moment to consider my personal PSA on these stoves. They are a pain in the ass to use, ridiculously powerful, and will get a literal wok HEY out of you if you get them screaming hot and drop a little oil in with no experience. Don't ask how I know 🙈🙉🙊 What I learned: these kinds of burners are awesome fun, but in the long run the whole stir-fry thing may not be worth the effort. As simple as it looks, it really takes a lot of experience to get it right and consistent, more so than a lot of other cooking. Cleanup is awful (grease splatters everywhere), you'll end up with undercooked or overcooked food half the time, the danger is real, and you really have to use a lot more oil than traditional stove saute/stir-frying. Now, if you can set it up outside with plenty of dirt or grass surrounding your station, or, inside with a flowing water wall and a night-shift cleaning crew, go for it 👍 Remember the fire extinguisher. Seriously. PS: please note, this is based on my experiences, I gave it a legitimate go for 2-3 months, and eventually figured out a successful work flow. I'm sure there are more experienced home cooks or chefs who can chime in and confirm there aren't issues and I was likely doing things wrong blah blah blah, but no one is going to convince me to go back 😝. I found the "hey" component not worth the effort.

Yesterday I found relaxation in washing and chopping and fiddly food preparation. It was warm (again, still) and the bright flavors of lemon and garlic called to me. I chopped some of the latest pork shoulder into bite-sized bits and marinated them for souvlaki. I trimmed, cut and steamed green beans, then mixed them with a Lebanese garlic/lemon/olive oil dressing. I've cooked both of these recently, so they aren't new to this topic. They're well worth a return visit. (I didn't realize how blurry the pork photo was until just now. Sorry!) I finally got around to making salad dressing -- something I've stalled off for no particular reason. Now I'll have one less excuse not to have salad for lunch! We've been doing leftovers, or peanut butter on crackers or toast, despite knowing it's not the best for our waistlines. This dressing is a simple garlic/salt/Meyer lemon juice/olive oil concoction. It separates quickly, but mixes just as quickly when I shake it. This time, I had all the materials for tzatziki, but by the time I'd finished with the other preps I decided against taking the time. I also decided against making pita. Pilaf, with the leftover marinade, would be fine. The walking around here is pretty, and there's a lot of room to walk without encountering other people. That occupied the rest of the afternoon. I'm out of skewers. I used half of our grilling wok over the barbecue grill. It still gets the same flavor, and may be easier than skewering all that meat! The view, just before I started cooking:

"Traditional" as in "not the appalling claptrap that most Americans believe to be Chinese." Iwatani makes high quality butane stoves, though none specifically designed to hold a wok. If you can suggest a Chinese alternative, I'm all ears - preferably without Iwatani's steep price.