Have I bought a Stainless Steel Wok?

Hi,

I'm just starting to learn to cook chinese food so please forgive me
if my questions seems ignorant.

I just bought a new wok from my local Chinese supermarket. I knew I
should buy a carbon steel wok but I assumed that they would all be
there since they supply local Chinese restaurants etc. They all looked
the same to me and I couldn't even identify the difference in quality
between them so I just chose the most expensive one.

Anyway, when I came to season my wok something did not appear right.
The wok did not turn blueish black when heating the oil with a paper
towels and wooden tongs. It just started go dark brown slowly but not
uniformly eventually turning black in parts. When it came to using the
wok for the first time I was very disappointed with the results. Food
seemed to burn easily and stick to the bottom.

I have cleaned the wok with a scouring pad and removed all the black
patches. I believe I have in fact purchased a stainless steel wok and
not a carbon steel one. When I look at photos of carbon steel woks
they look more darkish grey than bright stainless steel. I have taken
some photos of the wok I purchased. It isn't all shiny as it was when
I purchased. There are some markings in Chinese - I would be interesed
in what they say.

http://img59.imageshack.us/img59/660...2008270at4.jpg
http://img59.imageshack.us/img59/211...2008272ro3.jpg
http://img59.imageshack.us/img59/211...2008272ro3.jpg
http://img154.imageshack.us/img154/3...2008275af0.jpg
http://img236.imageshack.us/img236/8...2008277pu8.jpg

Can anyone please confirm that I have in fact purchased a stainless
steel wok? I paid £22 for mine so its not the end of the world and I
am more interested in learning from my mistakes.

I am looking at purchasing a new one. One on Amazon which is 2.0mm
carbon steel but it has a flat base:

[Only registered users can see links. ]

There is a round bottomed made by Hancock

[Only registered users can see links. ]
[Only registered users can see links. ]

Is there any difference between round and flat bottomed ones. Please
help me chose - these are the only two that I can find suitable.

Many thanks for your help!

sure looks stainless to me. Awfully shiny for carbon steel.

Usually the cheapest hand hammered POS will be your best bet.

Any of the carbon steel woks your links point to will be fine.

Get a round bottomed one. Flat bottoms are worthless-- might as well just
get a big sautee pan. You can't flip and toss the food right in a flat
bottom wok, and the flat bottom means that the intense heat that's meant to
be at the very nadir of the wok ain't so intense and is spread out all over.

Hi,

Many thanks for your reply. The wok I bought is definitely aluminium -
I checked it with a magnet this morning. I think I'll get the Hancock
London Wok. My only concern was that its only 1 mm gauge. Will this
make any difference and lower than the norm? The flat bottomed one on
Amazon is 2 mm..

Many thanks for your help!

Hi,

Many thanks for your reply. The wok I bought is definitely aluminium
-
I checked it with a magnet this morning. It all makes sense now - the
only thing printed on the minimal packaging was 'Superlight'. It also
explains why it was twice of the price of the other woks the same
size.

I think I'll get the Hancock London Wok. My only concern was that its
only 1 mm gauge. Will this make any difference and lower than the
norm? The flat bottomed one on Amazon is 2 mm..

Many thanks for your help!

Doesn't look like carbon steel. More like aluminum.
Carbon steel woks have a coating on them-to protect them during
shipping-that needs to be scrubbed off before using the wok. That that
should be the LAST time the wok ever sees soap. Use a plastic scrungie-thpe
thing to clean it-similar to the thing you would clean a Teflon pan. Get a
hand hammered wok-you will see 'dents' on the surface of the pan.
Since you have square burners, depending on the size of them, the ring you
would need for a round bottom wok may make the wok unstable. So measure
first and get the flat bottom if need be.
Ignore the outside of the wok, it will get burned, marked up, etc. When
seasoning a wok for the first time-it is tedious. Oil, heat, cool, repeat.
Don't just do it a couple of times and assume it is okay to go. If you rush
it, the first meal will stick badly and then you have to start all over
again. If you miss any parts of the wok, it will rust.
I forget the brand name I have. I do know that Joyce Chen makes a carbon
steel wok, but I cannot tell you if it is any good.

"Distorted Vision" <[Only registered users can see links. ]> wrote in message
news:[Only registered users can see links. ]...
Hi,

I'm just starting to learn to cook chinese food so please forgive me
if my questions seems ignorant.

I just bought a new wok from my local Chinese supermarket. I knew I
should buy a carbon steel wok but I assumed that they would all be
there since they supply local Chinese restaurants etc. They all looked
the same to me and I couldn't even identify the difference in quality
between them so I just chose the most expensive one.

Anyway, when I came to season my wok something did not appear right.
The wok did not turn blueish black when heating the oil with a paper
towels and wooden tongs. It just started go dark brown slowly but not
uniformly eventually turning black in parts. When it came to using the
wok for the first time I was very disappointed with the results. Food
seemed to burn easily and stick to the bottom.

I have cleaned the wok with a scouring pad and removed all the black
patches. I believe I have in fact purchased a stainless steel wok and
not a carbon steel one. When I look at photos of carbon steel woks
they look more darkish grey than bright stainless steel. I have taken
some photos of the wok I purchased. It isn't all shiny as it was when
I purchased. There are some markings in Chinese - I would be interesed
in what they say.

http://img59.imageshack.us/img59/660...2008270at4.jpg
http://img59.imageshack.us/img59/211...2008272ro3.jpg
http://img59.imageshack.us/img59/211...2008272ro3.jpg
http://img154.imageshack.us/img154/3...2008275af0.jpg
http://img236.imageshack.us/img236/8...2008277pu8.jpg

Can anyone please confirm that I have in fact purchased a stainless
steel wok? I paid £22 for mine so its not the end of the world and I
am more interested in learning from my mistakes.

I am looking at purchasing a new one. One on Amazon which is 2.0mm
carbon steel but it has a flat base:

[Only registered users can see links. ]

There is a round bottomed made by Hancock

[Only registered users can see links. ]
[Only registered users can see links. ]

Is there any difference between round and flat bottomed ones. Please
help me chose - these are the only two that I can find suitable.

Many thanks for your help!

In article
<[Only registered users can see links. ]>,
Distorted Vision <[Only registered users can see links. ]> wrote:


Don't be so sure about aluminium. All right, forget alumium. What you
have is decided stainless, and specifically 300 series stainless. The
iron structure of the metal is cystaline, and thus non-magnetic.
Aluminium cannot get as shiny as the pans in your picures. And for the
price you paid (£22), you aluminium pan would be anodized, and likely
black anodized, which would further dull the finish.

Unlike a carbon steel wok, stainless steel is not seasoned, but for
clean-up, is fully immersible. Since you did try to season it, the
discolouration is not permanent, but does not harm the structure of the
pan since there is no way on your stove to get the pan heated to a point
of annealing (1040 degrees Celsius). If you do wish to restore the
original chrome like appearance, you would need to buff it with a series
of progressively finer grit polishes and a motorised buffing machine or
buffing pad on a drill, a lot of work that really isn't worth the effort
or cost (the compounds will add up to more than the £22 you paid for the
pan).

Now on the Hancock pan at only 1mm, my own wok is the same thickness,
and I think the chinese restaurants in my area tend to use woks of the
same thickness. I would think that thickness is going to be ideal for
heat distribution. In a wok, unlike sautes and skillets, you want hot
and cold spots, and quicker heat dissipation. A thicker metal is going
to be slower to cool and will spread the heat more widely. Also, home
stoves do not have the necessarily BTU's of commercial stoves, so they
can take much longer to heat up that hot spot on the wok to the
temperature you want.

jt

Thanks alot for the great insight. I'm going to go ahead and order the
Hancock pan but I was wondering if the stainless steel would be of any
use to me. I'm guessing that they must be better for some things
otherwise they wouldn't make them.

Can anyone please confirm that I have in fact purchased a stainless
steel wok? I paid £22 for mine so its not the end of the world and I
am more interested in learning from my mistakes.

unless you are tight on space, I would keep and use the stainless steel wok
for steaming and/or soups. You don't need a real wok for those types of
cooking.

Distorted Vision wrote:

"The Breath of a Wok" by Grace Young, has a lot of detail on woks, as
you might expect. It might be worth your while to read some of it in a
library or bookshop.

The recommendations here about round bottoms will work OK when you are
using gas, as it appears you do at the moment. For electricity, however,
you just have to use a flat bottom, electricity being such a sucky
heating method.

I have one stainless steel wok that works with electricity fairly well,
except for food sticking far too easily to the surface.

The one I prefer is a flat-bottomed cast iron one, which I picked up in
a Great Wall chinese supermarket locally for about $16 (their last one
in stock, too). Its quite big, and very stable, and the bottom does not
distort, the way a carbon steel one I had did. Best of all, the food
does not stick at all. Temperature changes are a bit tricky, since it
takes a while for heat to penetrate all that iron, but I almost never
use the stainless steel one any more.

Cheers,

Ian

In article
<[Only registered users can see links. ]>,
Distorted Vision <[Only registered users can see links. ]> wrote:


The stainless steel is more for the ego. Some people just have to have
everything looking just so. These are the people who pay the premium
for the brushed steel fron dishwasher and all stainless stove and
fridge. They have the kitchen-aid stand mixer in stainless, the
quisinart coffee maker and food processor the same.

jt