Which wok?

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simona

simona

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Hi there,
Hope you are having a lovely morning, afternoon or evening depending on your time zone.

My misses wishes a wok for her up coming birthday, so let me know your experiences / thoughts. We cook on induction at home, so it should be a flat bottomed one, raw steel or coated is a by the by.

Cheers!

picture of curried pork and chicken ramen with pork katsu as an eye grabber
 

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If you need a flat bottom I would go with a Japanese Yamada hammered iron. Been using mine for about 10 years now and its replaced several traditional Chinese ones for stove top cooking. Outside on a wok burner is a different thing.
 
Summit (Made in Japan) would be my recommendation, a very good wok, reasonably priced, with some heft but not too heavy.
C6699FE9-3515-44B9-B607-E24E01F3A9F7.jpg
 
boomchakabowwow said:
no ideas on a flat bottom. but i can add that i think a 14" wok is about the smallest i would go. 35.56 cm. :D
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Yeah, 14 is a good size—although kinda depends on the cook. I've got 14, 12, 10, and 9.5 inch woks. My 9.5 inch, flat bottom wok gets the most use—easier to clean, lighter, takes up less space on the stove where I typically have other pots going at the same time.
 
DitmasPork said:
Yeah, 14 is a good size—although kinda depends on the cook. I've got 14, 12, 10, and 9.5 inch woks. My 9.5 inch, flat bottom wok gets the most use—easier to clean, lighter, takes up less space on the stove where I typically have other pots going at the same time.
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good point. if you had to pick only one?
 
I bought a ‘hand hammered’ pow wok from the Wok Shop and it’s a piece of ****. Clearly machine stamped on a press; the flat bottom is not flat and is impossible to sweep food out of with a spatula. I complained to the shop owner, and she insisted it was hand hammered, to make the bottom flat. Junk.
 
My wok (14" round bottom) is around 5" inches (or just a tiny bit under, eyeballing it) tall. That works just fine.

The other thing I would look for is a pronounced outward flare. A wok is no good if the sides are too close to vertical. The shallower sides on a traditional wok allow you to "store" food there after it has been fried, when you don't want to fry it any more, but still keep it warm.

The shallow sides also allow you to drizzle in soy sauce or oil (or any other liquid) such that part of it evaporates and the remainder hits the food already hot from all sides, instead of dousing the food with cold liquid.
 
I got the Joyce Chen flat bottom wok off Amazon. I followed Kenji Lopez-Alt's seasoning instructions, and after one round on the stove it'll cook eggs without sticking. It's 14" and $30. https://a.co/d/hSTBE4p
 
The Yamada's are a great wok. They are made in 2 thicknesses, 1.2 and 1.6 mm. I have a 14 inch 1.6mm flat bottom and love it. It's my go to wok for larger stir fries. You might also look at the Yosukata woks..I dont have one but my work colleague has one and likes it. Another brand that gets a lot of buzz in the stir fry crowd is the ZhenSanHuan woks which are hand hammered. This popularity comes as an alternative to the Cen Brothers hand hammered woks from Shanghai who went out of business a few years ago. Those woks are coveted by their owners..one is on the cover of Grace Young's book "The Breath Of A Wok"". There are also some very nice production and small boutique woks that are quite nice. I have a MadeIn wok, which is carbon steel but only 12 inches. I found it exceedingly easy to season, and it is now pretty much my daily driver for woks. Take a look at the Smithey carbon steel wok, if you're interested in a nice boutique wok maker. They are very nice looking but pretty pricey. Much like kitchen knives...you can do down a rabbit hole with woks, albeit not as deep as kitchen knives..There are woks that will take some work to season up, and will perform adequately, but if you take your time and do your research, there are some really nice woks out there.
 
Thanks again for all the comments - I went for the Yamada in the end; raw steel (what's not to like?) lightweight - my misses is not a big person - lots of comments about the handle not getting too hot, no rivets or welds.

I ordered one from
https://www.shokunin.com/enwhich I just discovered. Looks like a great distributor, very reasonable prices and a flat rate shipping anywhere for 2800 yen per order!

Cheers and have a fine day wherever you find your self :)
 
mengwong said:
I have the same model and only one complaint – the balance point is just past the flat spot so it tends to tilt toward the handle when empty. Maybe this is not a bug but a feature? So you can somehow control the pooling of oil?
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Hmmm, that’s interesting. I can’t say that I’ve noticed that with mine. It sits flat when empty without issue. I wonder if you got one with poor QC?
 
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