By 苏剑林 | November 13, 2023
Iron wok (Internet image)
Many students who know how to cook have probably struggled with one thing: choosing a frying pan.
The dilemma regarding frying pans ultimately boils down to the balance between non-stick performance and convenience. The simplest non-stick pan is, of course, the coated one. If your only heat source at home is an induction cooker and your cooking habits are relatively gentle, then a coated non-stick pan is often the best choice. However, once you have a gas stove with an open flame, or if you prefer high-heat stir-frying (bao chao), a coated pan may no longer be suitable. After all, there is always a risk of the coating peeling off at high temperatures. In such cases, one generally considers uncoated non-stick pans.
There are many varieties of uncoated non-stick pans, such as simple iron woks, stainless steel pans with honeycomb patterns, titanium pans, pure titanium pans, etc., and their prices generally increase accordingly. However, in the end, I believe most people will return to the humble iron wok.
The iron wok was the original choice to begin with. But since newer options like stainless steel and titanium pans have appeared, it means traditional iron woks have drawbacks that some find difficult to accept. Simply put, the disadvantage of iron woks is that traditional "tutorials" emphasize "maintenance" too much—such as seasoning the pan, drying and oiling it after every use, not using it for boiling soup, not using dish soap, and not putting it in the dishwasher. If one uses an iron wok under these cautious constraints, it clearly deviates from the original intent of using an iron wok: "simple and durable."
Note that what I am referring to here are the traditional "usage tutorials." It is a problem with traditional tutorials, not with the iron wok itself. It’s not necessarily true that something inherited from our ancestors is always correct. Habitually drying and oiling the pan, never boiling soup, and never using soap can indeed form an oil film to prevent sticking, but it also means every dish we cook carries a bit of "aged old oil," which doesn't seem like a healthy choice.
In fact, even without the traditional "seasoning" ritual and even with thorough cleaning after every use, an iron wok can achieve non-stick results without needing to cultivate a layer of old oil film. The non-stick technique is very simple; just follow these three steps every time you cook:
1. Turn on the heat without adding oil first and let the iron wok heat up thoroughly. The purpose of this step is to let the iron molecules expand with heat and dry out any moisture. Even if the surface of the wok looks dry, moisture may remain between the molecular gaps; therefore, whether the wok is dry or wet, it must be fully heated.
2. Add oil and thoroughly coat (lubricate) the pan. The purpose of this step is to use cooking oil to fill the gaps created by the thermal expansion of the iron molecules, preventing food items from getting into these gaps and causing sticking.
3. If you add ingredients directly now, they may not stick, but because the temperature is very high, they might burn easily (note that "sticking" and "burning" are not the same thing). At this point, there are two choices: 1) In professional kitchens, they usually pour out the hot oil, add fresh cold oil, and then add the ingredients; 2) At home, you can simply turn off the heat for a minute before adding the ingredients.
These three steps are essentially the same as "seasoning" a new pan. In other words, the fundamental way to make an iron wok non-stick is to perform a simple seasoning every time you use it, rather than focusing on so-called "maintenance." In fact, most people who have cooked for a long time probably know these three steps intuitively. Perhaps they cannot summarize them as steps one, two, and three or explain the underlying principles, but instinctively they know how to operate to make the pan less likely to stick.
Adding another photo of a dish here at random.
Once you understand the principle of non-stick iron woks, the disadvantage of the iron wok is resolved. Use it however you want, wash it however you want—there’s no problem. So, as the cheapest option available, what reason is there not to use one? Therefore, as the title states, "the ultimate destination of frying pans is the iron wok." Just choose a simple iron wok and focus more energy on other aspects of cooking. By the way, I suggest choosing one with a handle. Even if you don't toss the pan (tian shao), you occasionally need to shake the pan, and a handle is clearly more convenient. Just choose a plain round wooden handle; I don't recommend various "ergonomic" handles with strange shapes or materials.
Compared to the non-stick nature of frying pans, what I really want to complain about is this: everyone is flocking to research non-stick frying pans, so why hasn't anyone researched non-stick spatulas? Sometimes when frying an egg or fish, if you don't toss the pan but use a spatula to flip it, the pan might not stick, but the spatula ends up covered in stuck bits, resulting in a broken dish. From this, it is evident that among those who research cookware, very few actually know how to cook.
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