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I recently purchased a Craft carbon steel 14", round-bottomed wok. I want to season it properly and there is a wealth of conflicting information about doing so. I've picked out among it all what I believe is a good plan of action but still have a couple questions I bet the eG hive mind can help me answer. I've dug around in our archives and if I've missed anything I'd welcome any links to previous discussions. Opinions, as usual, high and low, are warmly welcome. Equipment: Also on hand is a cast iron wok ring that fits my wide-format gas burner perfectly - this is high setting: So no jet-powered high-output butane here. Punch List: Scrub both sides with Scotch-Brite pad and Dawn soap until no trace of shipping coating remain. People say about a 1/2 hour should do it. True? False? Longer? Use 320-grit metal sandpaper on both sides - this apparently opens the pores so it absorbs the seasoning oil coats. Shall I use coarser/finer grit paper? Do it at all? Remove wooden handle. Set on ring and heat at high setting until (very) hot. ...or just "hot", not "very hot", how about "smoking hot"? Have quarter sheet pan with about 1/4" of good oil - I have flax and grapeseed - Which is better? Using kitchen tongs, wipe balled-up paper towel in sheet-pan oil and apply thinly - and quickly - over entire inside surface. Smoking occurs... When smoking stops, re-apply oil in the same manner - slide wok around ring so the outer edges get heat consistent with the inner bowl. Repeat a bajillion times. No, really, six? Twelve? Twenty times? A set of six, then let cool, then repeat? More questions: When is it safe to apply thin oil layers to the bottom? How many coatings go there? Same as the inside bowl? I'm told the carbon steel changes color, the best being a bluish tint - unlikely owing to the weak gas flame output. What color am I looking for and is it a sign it's ready for a test stir-fry? I've made what I see now are rookie mistakes in the past, like put in peanut oil and leave over night; fry up a pound of bacon, all of which leaves a gross sticky surface. Some YouTube videos have dudes burning the handles, causing oil fires... all more interested in seeing themselves on YouTube rather than seasoning a wok. Intriguing Alternative: Charm the Vietnamese kitchen staff at the Thai place down the street to do it for me....

Curious if anyone out there has had any experience with induction wok burners, for restaurant or home use. Up until recently the only ones available have been pricy restaurant models or equally pricy built-in models. However, I've noticed a few much cheaper options coming to market. For home use, there's this Nuwave countertop model — $169, but it looks like it has sold for $99 at some points in the past. 120v, 1500w I'm also seeing a number of much less expensive countertop restaurant models: Galaxy GIWC18: 120v 1800w, $229 Avantco IWC35: 240v 3500w, $359 Sunpentown SR-34BWC: 240v 3400w, $612 Wondering if anyone has any experience or thoughts on any of these new models. I was thinking of adding a 240v outlet when we renovate our kitchen, but one of the 120v options might be a nice stopgap. I can't find any reviews on the restaurant models. The Amazon reviews for the NuWave are mixed, but a lot of the negative reviews seem to be from people who don't have a clue how to season and use a carbon steel wok. There's also a wok cooking teacher in Florida who seems to like the NuWave as an alternative to an Iwatani butane stove.

I've had these wok tools ever since purchasing my first wok some 40 + years ago: 14" long, maybe they are cast iron or carbon steel. The wooden handles came loose 39+ years ago, but surprisingly have never been lost. Now that I've resuscitated a wok (not my first one) and am using it frequently, I really like the sound these tools make when stir frying. I wish I could decipher the hieroglyphics inside the bowl of the ladle... Anyone still using these tools? And Grace Young (amongst others) has her opinions about the shovel...

Apologies to David Byrne et al. In an attempt to become as annoying as Alton Brown, Kenji writes about how to achieve that elusive wok hei at home. Exactly what @liuzhou has been telling us for years. And as an old (er) home cook, I try to make great food at home for sure - but I don't try to be a restaurant. Well - this is for those who do... https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/04/dining/stir-fry-recipe-wok-hei.html?action=click&module=Features&pgtype=Homepage

I have a less than excellent stove, and would like a butane burner for indoor and outdoor use. I've seen Chinese cooking channels use butane for traditional wok cooking and would appreciate a recommendation. I quite like Iwatani products, but the 15000BTU 35FW is a bit steep, and there are less expensive options of similar output - possibly some designed specifically for woks. Alternately, I'm open to a 50,000+ BTU propane burner like this one if it offers the necessary heat. Does anyone know if these can be used with disposable propane cylinders with an adapter?

I am never on the breaking news try it end of food. Sous vide - can't even go there.But this torch method has me a bit transfixed. Anyone gonna give it a go? Don't presently have a propane torch. https://www.seriouseats.com/2020/02/hei-now-youre-a-wok-star-a-fiery-hack-for-stir-frying-at-home.html

I heard that you need quality iron or carbon steel woks and a very powerful gas burner for getting good wok hei and making the best tasting Chinese stir fry dishes like restaurants make. I have a wok and a wok burner that I think work for this purpose, but would like to know what to do now. The main problem I'm encountering is that nearly all cookbooks seem to be designed to teach people to cook on low-power standard home stoves rather than in the high heat setting with a more restaurant-like round-bottom wok on a powerful gas burner. There's one particular recipe at Chinese restaurants I really like and want to learn to cook at home. I think it's this: https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7603564 Where should I go to learn to do this correctly? Is there a particular cookbook or education source that teaches you to cook restaurant-type Chinese food with these powerful gas burners in particular? I've been making similar things at home with beef & broccoli stir fray seasoning packets and with the wok, but notice if I use the suggested amount of water for the sauce it boils off in the wok very quickly, and leaves my broccoli relatively uncooked. I think I need to learn how to cook stuff on the higher heat specifically to make it work out right. My stir fries with the sauce packets taste pretty good if I add more water than the sauce packet suggests so it doesn't all boil away, but I don't think this is the right way to cook it to get wok hei, and probably aren't as good as my favored meal at the Chinese restaurant I like. What to do?

A new show on YouTube is just coming out now, from our own @Fengyi. I had the pleasure of hanging out with her for a day on our trip to Beijing, and her great personality definitely comes out in her show. This show is all about the local foods of various areas in China and the wines that pair best with them. Fongyee travels around to all different areas, talks with chefs and shows some awesome food porn, all with tons of knowledge to boot. Here's a link to the first episode:

I'm interested in learning to cook Chinese food with a similar flavor quality as you would get in a good Chinese restaurant with a lot of wok hei. I did a small amount of reading from books like Stir Frying to the Sky's Edge and Breath of the Wok to get some background knowledge on this topic, but still have some questions. I purchased this burner to get more heat and increase the wok hei in my stir fries, which claims to have 65,000 BTU output (I saw many people on these forums mention using it in other threads, so I'm guessing it's a good choice, but just wanted to check). There appear to be videos of people cooking on it on the Amazon page with traditional round-bottom woks, so I'm assuming it will work well with round bottom woks. This burner should also have plenty of BTUs to get restaurant-quality wok hei, right? I saw there were other burners on the market that have higher BTUs, but I thought they might not be as good for this purpose since they were not purpose-built for wok cooking. Can any of you comment on this? Before realizing that round-bottom woks are better and allow cooking with less oil, I purchased this wok from my local Sur la Table, which is a 14" flat-bottom carbon steel wok imported from Taiwan. Now I am somewhat interested in finding a more authentic/traditional carbon steel wok with a round bottom for use with the new burner I mentioned above, but am having trouble finding one I like. I'm trying to find one sold by a reputable company which is produced in a country with decent cookware regulations and safety laws to minimize health risks associated with lead contamination in cookware, such as Japan. (I'm hoping to avoid woks from countries such as China, because of scary stories like this, this, this, this or this about product safety or reliability issues). While this wok fails my lead safety requirements I just mentioned, it is the type I should be looking for to get this wok hei on my new burner, right? I was wondering, because I noticed in videos that Chinese restaurants like PF Chang's they use woks that are all one metal piece with no wood on them, and the handles are always made of the same metal that the wok itself is made of. Can anyone else comment on this? Do you use woks with wooden handles for ultra high-heat Chinese cooking, or do you prefer the woks that are all metal and have metal handles? Does anyone have suggestions for good woks that meet my criteria mentioned above? Would my Sur la Table wok be a bad choice for use with my new high heat burner because of the wood handles and flat bottom? PF Chang's restaurants say in their YouTube video that they use these carbon steel woks from Japan because Japan makes the best woks for this style of high-heat cooking, but unfortunately they don't provide information about the company. The building says "Summit" on it, but I could not find any Summit brand woks on Amazon unless they come from third-party sellers (not sure how reputable they are). If anyone knows where I could get one of these Japanese carbon steel woks they show in the video (or something similar you personally think is of great quality for my purposes), that would be terrific.

We are trying to acquire the above kind of cooking wok for our bulk cooking requirements where large quantities of broths being made or curries or sauces. There is a planetary rotation shaft which mixes the food at a tunable rpm. And there are gas burners at the bottom of the wok. The vendors often asks what kind of viscosity the food has and what type of foods being made? How this viscosity related to this cooking wok equipment? Is this factor a critical one while considering this kind of wok?

Ive gotten their magazine from the library before its interesting. I got an email that took me here : Its a kikstarter page , but I can't seem to just paste the URL /projects/936865763/the-illustrated-wok-chinese-food-like-youve-never?ref=7vcjtf if you type https://www.kickstarter.com before the partial URL above ' if you type ' it might get you there.

I am thinking of radically changing my cooking layout, and am thinking of using the miele 15" gas wok burner as the centerpiece. I do a lot of wok cooking, but my GE 36" cooktop is not great for this application. I am concerned about flame shape: I really want this to be a focused flame suitable for woks, as a contrast to the unusable wide ring of flame that my existing stove puts out. The GE measures a lot of BTUs, but since the flames shoot out rather than up, only the widest pans capture all of the heat, and this flame pattern is the opposite of the focused heat at the bottom of the wok that you want for proper wokking. Does anyone have the Miele? Can you take a picture of the flame pattern with a wok in place? Any other suggested burners? I am also curious about the wok-mon insert, but that remains kickstarter vaporware for now. Pre-orders only since 2014.

I am thinking of buying one of these. This particular model has an 1800 watt heating element and according to the reviews on Amazon.ca, gets really hot. It also got good reviews there, 24 people gave it 5 stars, 2 gave it 4 stars. There were no other ratings. One of the reasons I would like one is that I can use it on my balcony to deep fry stuff. While I do occasionally deep fry in a pot on the stove, I don't like living with the smell of cooking oil afterwards. Does anyone have this particular model?

I have looked for years for a black steel wok with a flat bottom it had to be thick steel to stop it from warping on the induction cooktop 3500W Burner. Well I found it made by the French company Mauviel it is 12.5" diameterwith 3mm thick steel the flat bottom is 4 1/2 inches, although it has a flat inside too it cooks wonderfully. The weight is 5lbs heavy but manageable .The cost is $100 considering there is no alternative it's cheap.Here is my review. I know there are people looking for a good wok for induction so I hope some find this post good information.I do have a JWright cast iron wok that I've used for 5 years and it too is great but it's discontinued. This M Steel Wok is much better. Posted some images of the seasoned wok so you can see it . This is after oven season @500 Degrees.Turning black already non stick .Happy ! Mauviel M'Steel Black Steel Wok, 11.8", Steel If you have any ?? please post i'll do my best to answer.

What's the best wok cookbook for vegetarian cooking? (No meat or seafood). Grace Young seems to have several but they all seem rather "meaty".

So the other day I bought one of those Thai grills/charcoal wok stoves, for getting serious damn heat outdoors when stir frying. Loaded it up with hot charcoal tonight and sure enough it got HOT. So hot that when I added my marinaded chicken cubes, a portion of chicken literally exploded out of the wok and headed straight for me, burning my arm in the process. What didn't hit my arm travelled a good 5 feet or so. I guess maybe the chicken was too wet? Is one not supposed to marinade meat when dealing with such high temperatures? I imagine it still wasn't as hot as a commercial wok range, but then also I'm using a 14" wok, as opposed to a much larger one typical for such a high-heat application. Basically, I got this grill in part to get searing heat and super wok hei, which I achieved...so how do I prevent further injury?

I am one of the many disciples of Fuchsia Dunlop, and now devoting a great deal of my cooking to Chinese, and particularly Sichuan food. Like most home chefs, I am frustrated by the use of my western -- in my case Viking -- stove, and the problem of getting enough heat into my food quickly enough to sear it without steaming. I have gotten some improvement by switching to a cast iron wok, which seems to get a good bit hotter than my carbon steel wok, but its still not quite what I would like. I read the post about the WokMon below, and will consider that, but it looks a bit scary to be using in a home kitchen, and I'll need a stool to reach up and cook over it. I see that Viking makes a special grate with a wok cutout that theoretically will allow the base of the wok to get into closer contact with the flames. I'm wondering if anybody has used this, and can comment on its effectiveness. Thanks. http://www.allvikingparts.com/CWGT_Wok_Grate_for_Custom_Series_p/cwgt.htm

Just recently read this: http://www.seriouseats.com/2014/05/the-wok-mon-converts-your-home-burner-into-a-wok-range-solution.html?ref=pop_serious_eats Thoughts? I really want to get my hands on one and give it a go!

I frequently hear that true Chinese stir-fries can't be cooked in home stoves because they aren't hot enough. I'm curious to hear what fellow egulleters think about this. I often cook Chinese food at home on my 20-year old average gas stove and I think that I am getting good results. I am able to get brown spots on veggies and proteins without overcooking the interior, on medium-high heat. I find that when I turn the heat all the way to high, I need to move faster and because precise timing is more important, I'm more likely to make mistakes (e.g. sometimes the oil will overheat, or veggies get a bit too scorched). In other words, I don't feel limited by the heat level of my old gas stove. I understand that in Chinese restaurants they have crazy hot stoves - I heard 200 BTU (is this even possible?) I have no doubt that professional cooks can handle the speed and precision of 200 BTU, but I'm wondering if that's really necessary to achieve the "wok hai" that we associate with a good stir-fry. There is no controversy in the fact that home stoves are capable of causing the Maillard reaction in western cooking. Meaning, we can all cook a thin piece of fish or meat that browns on the outside without overcooking on the inside. I don't see how this is different from wok cooking. Or am I not thinking correctly? Would love to hear your thoughts!

I just bought a wok in a Chinese restaurant supply store in Philly's Chinatown. It was $15 for a 14" wok and seems to be basic, all-metal, the type of thing that everyone on here recommends. It has a single metal handle in the same metal as the bowl, welded to the bowl. Here is an image of pretty similar model: http://www.wokshop.com/HTML/products/woks/wok-iron-pow.html So far, I have only used once - on Saturday, I used it along with a bamboo steamer to hold the wrappers for a Peking Duck appetizer station. We put the wok on a riser, put sterno underneath, hot water in the wok and set the steamer on top - just as you would to steam product at home, only using sterno as the heat source. It worked great, but when the dishwashers ran the wok through the dishwasher at work, It came away with a sticky film all over it, inside and out. There is one spot on the interior of the wok that looks like it was scrubbed - probably with a plastic scouring pad - and that area is not sticky. It isn't the dishwasher, per se, there is no film on anything else. It seems to be some sort of reaction to a coating on the metal of the wok. So, the last wok I bought was from IKEA (don't judge ) Do woks like this need to be treated in some way?

Hello all, My name in Rustem, I live in Switzerland. I was reading this forum for few of years (well, mostly watching photos in “chinese eats at home” topic and getting salivation:). I like Chinese food, especially stir-fry and I want to cook it at home. I have electrical stove with ceramic surface and after reading internet and reviews I went to a shop and bought an expensive BODUM CAST IRON WOK K0810. I followed every word of user manual. Though, every time I cook something it sticks to the surface at the bottom (chicken, meet, noodles – everything, except vegetables), burns and forms a layer of burned staff which is hard to remove. I am very disappointed because this wok has the “special one-layer coating which is a mixture of glass and porcelain” and supposed to be non-stick (ot it is just a marketing bullshit ?). I noticed that inside surface of my wok is not smooth, but with little bumps (I believe it is called “coarse surface”) - could it be a reason why food sticks to it ? Another problem that no matter for how long I pre-heat wok, it starts with very good temperature (oil is smoking), but loses it quickly so food is not fried but steamed and I believe it is mostly because of layer of burned staff at the bottom which blocks the heat. Can somebody help me to understand what I am doing wrong? Jest to let you know: - I use maximum heat setting on my stove. Though, stove is too “smart” and turns off heating element periodically, I cannot control it. But I don't think temperature is the problem as wok is hot enough to smoke the oil. - I pre-heat for 10 min dry wok until it is hot (it is a heavy wok and it takes time to heat it !), then add oil and wait few seconds until it starts smoking. - then add ingredients such garlic and ginger (almost every recipe starts with them) and they immediately stick to the bottom and burn !! If I add meat before , it sticks too. Please help me. I really want to archive the results of this video: As you can see nothing stick to his wok, not even noodles ! Do you think it is doable with my current wok and stove ? Should I buy new wok ? Which one ? Thank you Rustem.

Anyone have experience with high BTU propane wok burners designed for outdoor use? I'd love to get some wok hai at home, and the idea of having outdoor stirfry gatherings in the summertime is quite appealing.. I looked around a bit and here are some models that caught my eye. There are a bunch of cast iron 100,000BTU wok burners on eBay for around $100. Bare bones, but they look like they'd do the job. For $75 more, you can get a 100kBTU Thai burner that looks nicer and comes with a stand. ( http://importfood.com/thaigasburner.html ) . The most expensive burner's I've found have been from Auscrown / Rambo ( http://www.auscrown.com/page/shop/browse/a/category/e/highpressurewokburners ) but they look to be worth the price. I like piezo ignitions over pilot lights, especially for outdoor use. The HP200LPB looks especially hot (har har). Auscrown also makes a little stainless cart you can mount their burners in. Anyone using these or other work burners? Anyone know how they compare to similar out burners designed for turkey frying (or the stuff from Bayou Classic)? And while we're talking wok burners, can anyone comment on induction wok cookers? My suspicion is that portable ones won't be able to draw the power required to get hot enough, but if you ran one at a higher voltage i bet it could get pretty scorching. But would it get hot enough to flame the breath of the wok?

Hello all, I appologize if this is not an appropriate place to ask questions but I have probably searched whole of internet without any luck. This is my last resort (maybe it should have been the first) I have an Iwachu traditional, round bottom cast iron wok, which I use on my home stove. The double gas burner with the wok ring has about 3 or 4 kW in power; arround 10.000 BTUs I think. My normal proceedure includes pre-heating the wok for about 5-10 minutes before I start cooking. The first problem is the oil. I use sunflower oil which starts smoking immediately as I put it in. The second problem are the aromatics - garlic and ginger. I throw them in, shove them around a little bit, after 5-10 seconds I put the meat in. Aromatics always burn . The third problem is the meat. Just today I cut some beef into thin strips, say 5mm thick and about an inch long, and stir fried them with the aromatics. They let out a lot of water which did evaporate but it left the meat pretty tough. Im losing sanity here , any help appreciated! Cheers and many greets from Croatia! Alex

I recently bought a new carbon steel wok (wooden handle) and now I have to season it. I know the standard practice would be to heat it till smoking hot and then apply oil until the surface turns black. I live in a condo with less than ideal kitchen ventilation though. Is there any way I can do this without triggering the building fire alarm and pissing off my neighbours and local fire department?

Does anyone know , who might sell portable wok carts.. with a built in burner or two and a back splash. I dont want a tri-pod set up!! I want something I can use on my deck outside!! Curious? Paul Like this?