Woklessness [S. Worthen

In fact, I have two.

Do you ever need to use them simultaneously?

I have used both of them in the course of making the same meal, but my cooker isn't big enough to use both simultaneously. However, I frequently think about buying a very small wok for making sauces so I could have two going at once.

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I also have two woks and I do use them simultaneously when making Chinese-type food.

I can just about squeeze them on the stove at the same time (the two big rings are positioned diagonally), with a pan for rice on the back burner.

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I used to own a wok, but it took up too much space and I rarely ever used it. Could basically do the same thing with a pan.

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I couldn't do without being able to push the items that are most done up out of the heat.

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A similar effect can be gained by pushing the stuff that's most done to the cooler side of the pan.

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My pans spread the heat evenly across the bottom - there isn't a cooler side!

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If there's space on the cooker, you can put just one half of the pan on the heat and thus create a cooler side (cheffy trick - but chefs have vast multi-burner stoves designed for tricks like this...).

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I'm not sure where I read it but some Asian cookbook said that if you don't have a specialized wok burner, there's actually not much point in owning a wok, because you can't heat the sides well anyway, so you might as well just use a good skillet.

I use an Ikea stainless steel frying pan and it works FAR better than our nonstick wok (which lost all of its nonstick onto our FOOD) did.

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Also, I'm AmeriBritish. Do I count? ;)

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The book didn't define its terms, so I didn't either. Count if you want to!

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tbh, the reason I got rid of my wok was because it heated unevenly on my electric stove. I use a Calphalon aluminium "everyday pan" (basically a 12" saute pan) and it works beautifully.

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When I bought our wok, I was told that even if we had nonstick everything else, we shouldn't get it for a wok or we'd never achieve decent browning on it. It's a good wok and has been quite easy to clean over the four years we've owned it. It worked fine in previous kitchens; now, for the first time, we have a wok burner and it's more efficient.

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I am a special snowflake! I am British but do not live in Britain! And, incidentally, we do not own a wok.

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That's why I used "and/or", just so it would include special snowflakes like you.

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...so you did, and logically it does! I am sorry, I have absolutely no idea how my brain did not parse that.

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I was thinking as I wrote it that it was moderately wordy for a poll, but I didn't take the time to be more concise.

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Hmm. I am not British, nor do I live in Britain, and I have legal title to a wok, but it is in a storage compartment in Gonzales, LA, which is a long way away from here.

I miss many of the things in that storage compartment, but the wok is not much on my mind.

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Not only do I own a wok - I cooked with it tonight (veggie and red rice stirfry).

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I should clarify that I used to own a wok until quite recently, but my ruthless de-stuffing has left me wokless.

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I, an American residing in the US with my British partner, own a wok.

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Only very strange, or extremely impoverished, people don't own a wok! This is my prejudice and I'm sticking with it. A wok is, to me, the single most useful cooking vessel in existence.

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I'm willing to believe that 35% of British households are very strange. :)

Edited to correct my arithmetic.

Edited Date: 2010-05-28 10:36 pm (UTC)

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I'm willing to believe that approximately 100% of British Households are very strange in some way...

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I do have a wok, but I need to get a better one. I want something heavier that will retain heat better.

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I have two (rather cheap) woks, but our tendency to immediately fill them with soapy water after cooking "to make it easier to wash them up" and then leaving them soaking for several days or more has meant they're both gently rusting away!

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One advantage of having invested in a moderately-expensive wok: we always have a really good incentive to wash and dry it promptly, to avoid needing a new one. I'm sure I wouldn't be so diligent if it were more disposable.

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The people I live with won't eat food you cook in a wok.

We do own a number of cast-iron skillets, however.

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Yep. Non-British, and non-wok-owning, here. But I couldn't cook without various cast-iron skillets.

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Oh, man. I was so excited when I got my very own cast iron! It really made me feel like I finally had a decent set of kitchen equipment.

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I'm sorta kinda British and I own two woks

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I have a wok but only use it rarely. Uh. That is to say, I use it for its intended purpose only rarely. I use it to hold candy or granola bars quite often.

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I object to your binary description, since I live in the UK, have an upbringing that is very close to that of the average UK citizen, but am emphatically not a UK citizen (note, I *am* a British[1] person geographically, after all, but definitely not British in the way you mean).

And I do not own a wok at the moment. I use my flatmate's non-stick one. However, when I get the chance to redo the kitchen, the gas hob will include a wok ring which will be the most used ring on the hob. [2]

And I will head down to Chinatown, buy n in the series of decent woks, prove it the way my mother taught me[3] and yell at G if he tries to wash it without my authority.

[1] Celtic nations, after all.
[2] I had an English Chinese colleague who told me that her parent had a friend who had a rig in the back garden to provide appropriate levels of heat for her woks. She told this story to amaze non-Chinese colleagues - she was equally amazed that I went "of course she did!"
[3] Ma taught me how to prove an iron frying pan. It turns out it's identical to proving a wok.

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So what's your mother's proving method?

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I was trying to avoid defining my terms because the cited statistic failed to do so. It just referred to "British Households" - whatever that means.

I knew it was problematic when I posted it. I'm actually somewhat surprised you're the only person who has objected to it so far!

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To be more precise, there is a wok in the house, but it's not mine.

One day I will have a place of my own and put good kitchen equipment in it.

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And then there's "I am British, but I don't live in Britain, but I DO own a wok."

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You are included in the poll! That's what the "and/or" is for.

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I have, um, four woks? At least? (Am upstairs; going down to the kitchen to count would be a trek too far. This is the best I can do on my fingers. Excluding all those wok-like-but-not-officially-wok-type pans like the karahi...)

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So what was the verdict, upon inventory? Four?

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We are on our third wok, but if we cooked on electricity (which we would never willingly do) we probably wouldn't use it very often. As it is, it is used at least once a week. Good for deep frying small quantities, too.

However, non-stick woks are a waste of time.

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The only reason I have a pan as well as a wok, is to make pancakes! :)

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Otherwise they would be wokcakes?

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I =/= household. I do not own a wok, but my landlady does. But can we really be called a "household" in our quasi-bedsit-with-access-to-the-kitchen arrangements?

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I've got a very deep frying pan with a lid that isn't technically a wok, but could pass for one, and I certainly use it to stir fry.

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I used to own one but ditched it for cupboard space.

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I put myself as non British wok owner, but technically I am a UK citizen (via British parents) and the vessel I claim as a wok is an arguably heretical flat bottomed thing. So make of that what you will.

Personally I can't think of woks without thinking of Stephen Yan ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Yan , not apparently to be confused with Martin Yan, which I did), the Canadian TV chef and wok pun enthusiast (The title of his show was "Wok with Yan").

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Actually flat bottomed woks are not at all unusual. Toronto has a large Chinese and SE Asian population but most places don't have gas so flat bottomed woks are pretty much the norm.

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