Induction vs. gas, a US-based dilemma

So, not a karahi, then? Interesting.

Per Saragama, the karahi seems like a worthy alternative?

For my part, I’d choose a casserole/Dutch oven with a diameter of 24-28 cm.

What I want to know is, how did they get Richard Dreyfuss to narrate?

:smiley:

P.S. I really enjoyed the video and will be looking at more stuff on their channel. Thanks!

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For NYT and WaPo, the content is fully present and so you can hit refresh-then-stop a few times rapidly, and it’ll stop bugging you with a paywall and instead merely suggest (in a collapsible pane) that you might consider subscribing.

This doesn’t work with WSJ and ChiTrib, though. Their pages load without content past the lede.

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Wonderful hack. Thanks.

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To the extent you define wok hei as inviting the flame into the vessel to flash-fire the vaporized oils, I do this with regular frying pans, as long as they have fairly steep sides so the food won’t tumble out with the pan tilted, as easily (if not more easily) as with my wok.

The “if not more easily” comment is because the lower side height on these pans makes it easier to tip and get the flame to come inside using the burners I have available. They’re not exactly weak (18K & 15K front stove burners, 12K outside on the grill’s side burner) but they’re not the blast torches you see in commercial Chinese cookery.

(Caveat - see my thread on how badly gunked up my exhaust fan got.)


Edit - but now in reading further through the thread, I see your comment that the flash-flaming of the vaporized oils is only part of the story. And I have not tried this with a CS pan specifically because the sides are sloped enough I’m afraid the food would slide out. I’ve only done it with stainless and hard anodized aluminum pans. But I think my cast iron would fit all criteria. I’ll try one of them next time.

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This is amazing - thanks!

Aren’t they all?

:slight_smile:

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Just to clarify the rondeau is right for me. I answered a question about what other vessel is as versatile as the wok. I’m not interested in being an example for your post. I get that the cookware forum is a numbers game and it’s easy to compare 7mm discs and thick clad as being better than carbon steel, but I won’t pretend I know better than entire cultures worth of home cooks and professional chefs. And how dare you ignore the easy bake oven.

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Who was making this comparison in this thread? If anything my argument was for carbon steel or cast iron, as they’re considered essential to producing wok hei.

It’s a pretty significant part of the story, though. According to Kenji, anyway, tossing food through the steam and igniting the aerosolized oil droplets produce many of the Maillard/caramelization reactions one associates with wok hei. Just sorry to read about your poor exhaust fan!

I was trivializing the the cookware forum. One of many hints to leave me out of this absurd conversation.

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I guess your previous hints were too subtle!

I hit refresh twenty times. It still says I’ve reached my free article limit which is odd because I haven’t read the New York Times in many months due to the paywall.

You can clear nyt cookies and try again

Or if you search an article title there is usually a repost via another source

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I think the traditional wok shape you guys are discussing has one very large advantage over regular frying pans for stir fry in general and attaining wok hei in particular: The bell-shaped bottom collects the oil in somewhat of a deep, narrow pool that can be efficiently swirled to fry on the “walls” above. This shape makes it easy to control how much oil contact/immersion the food is given. Not so much with frypans, where the oil drains/spreads across the entire floor. IMO, this is why flat-bottomed woks are not a good choice unless your cooktop is flat and/or you can’t use a ring. `

And the size, relative to the food portion(s) being fired is important for ease and facility of tossing. My 2 cents.

Hey, shifting gears, does anyone here know the history of high-power wok cookery? Obviously there was no natural gas at a Tang emperor’s court. The peasantry likely used dung or wood for fuel, but what of their betters? Was charcoal made for them, or were deposits of coal available? Were their cooking fires stoked with bellows borrowed from their armorers or the Haka?

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I’m not concerned about reading the article. I’ve already read it and I know how feel about gas vs induction.

I was simply pointing out that the article isn’t readily accessible.

(post deleted by author)

This didn’t work with this article… even with an incognito window (which never saves any cookies), AND a different IP address via a VPN. So it would seem the NYT is lying to us about the number of free reads available regarding this article.

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Wow. I don’t know, b/c I have a sub, but for Tribune-owned sites turning off JavaScript does defeat the paywall - plus a lot of other functions.