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One of the most common concerns people have lately is having a healthy lifestyle. And while working out and being careful of what you eat both play a huge part in your well-being, you really shouldn’t forget about choosing the right cooking essentials. And out of all of them, what plays a major role in what you’ll be putting in your body is the pans and woks. Since they are the main thing people use for preparing food, choosing ones made from a quality material is super important for cooking and eating healthy.
But why choose a non-stick wok in particular?! What’s so special about it?
Well, non-stick woks are essential for cooking a delicious stir-fry. They are the main choice in Japanese and Chinese cuisine mainly because of their size, shape, but also because of their resistance to high temperatures. The range of such cooking essentials is huge, so going over the many types available on the market will help you make the right choice.
Which One Is the Best?
The thing is that non-stick woks prevent food from sticking, which makes cooking much easier, faster and cleaner. These woks seem perfect for frying any kind of food and turning them into the most tasty meals. The choice of such works is huge, however, only a few are considered the safest choice of them all.
Carbon Steel
Generally speaking, the carbon steel woks are durable, extremely safe, long-lasting and easy to use frying kitchen items. The greatest benefit of this material is that it develops a natural non-stick coating when oiled. In order to create this seasoning, you need to heat the wok, and this will create a layer of polymerised oil on the wok’s surface, making it easy to fry and cook different kinds of food.
The thing about carbon steel and its biggest quality is that its non-stick layer will only get better over time, so the older the wok, the better. Generally speaking, it’s said that there are two types of carbon steel woks: machine pressed and hand-forged. And even though they are identical and made from the same material, they do differ in the way they are made. This, on the other hand, is closely related to the way they react to food.
Machine-Pressed Carbon Steel Woks
These are often made from thin sheets of metal, as this allows them to conduct heat very quickly. This is quite important in Japanese and Chinese cuisine as the heat gives the food a wok hei hint, and that is why this wok is the most popular one among professional chefs. An important thing you should know is that you may not be able to achieve the same food taste as in restaurants because professional chefs use an industrial-grade gas stove that burns at over 100,000 BTU, and the burners in homes usually burn at around 7,000 BTU.
Hand-Forged Woks
These woks are made by heating iron until it’s red hot, after which it’s hammered over 100,000 times until forming a wok. An important difference between the handmade and machine-made woks is that the former are thicker and can retain heat more successfully. Given the fact that they retain heat better and longer, this can certainly make up for the firepower that most homes lack. Being thicker means that this wok is heavier than the machine-made, however you can still use and handle it daily.
Cast Iron Woks
Cast iron pans are one of the oldest and most commonly used types of pans since ancient times, so it isn’t strange that cast iron woks are as popular as cast iron pans. Cast iron woks are also extremely durable and excellent at retaining heat, which makes them perfect for cooking different types of food. Being extremely thick and heavy explains the fact that these woks tend to heat up slowly, so if this is a problem for you it would be better to stick to the carbon steel ones.
Another important thing you should know about these kitchen items is that their material tends to be brittle due to its high carbon content, so the chances of shattering when tossing them are huge. This fact precisely doesn’t make them the most ideal option for stir-frying, as this cooking process involves a lot of tossing, which unfortunately with this material can lead to its shattering. Additionally, these woks are extremely heavy, and if choosing a bigger size handling it daily can be quite a task, especially if you are a woman.
Coated Woks
The last option from which you can choose is the non-stick kitchen item coated with ceramic or Teflon. While the ceramic coating is considered super safe, you should stay away from Teflon as it is considered to contain harmful chemicals once the coating starts to wear off. Practice shows that no matter how durable the coating layer is, over time it will degrade because of the exposure to extreme heat. Plus, coatings like Teflon are super easy to scratch, which is just another way that harmful chemicals can be leached into your food. So when searching for such wok, make sure to consult with a professional in order to choose the safest option.
