Wok tips and tricks

Spread it out so it is not all piled up in the center.

If you add too many items, it will cool down your wok. Think about heating your wok for 5 to 10 minutes over the highest heat on a gas range that you can get. To reduce the meat's chewiness, slice meats against the grain. Peanut oil is also a good choice, and it imparts a slightly nutty flavor. To make a good stir-fry, you absolutely must have an extremely hot wok. Those things blast out 75, BTUs, which is about ten times hotter than the average burner on a home range.

The best woks are made of carbon steel. Note, you cannot do this with a non-stick coated wok. Also, you cannot do this on an electric range, since heating an empty pan on high could damage the pan. That is not to say you should not try it, but it is going to be challenging.

For instance, hard carrots need more time to cook than shrimp or thin strips of chicken breast. Your food will simmer or steam and not fry.

Wokade grönsaker thai

You really want it to fry—especially meats. Adding cold meat will instantly cool off your wok. So, since you cannot produce the same heat as a Chinese restaurant, you have to heat your wok for a long time. Check out these five cooking tips that can make your stir-fry a sure bet. When you are shopping for the meat at your supermarket or butcher, you will sometimes see strips of beef already cut up for sale as "stir-fry meat.

Also, if you add all your ingredients at once, you are not accounting for all the different cooking rates of your foods. If you have more than 8 ounces of meat, cook it in batches. First, heat up the oil, then add flavoring ingredients like garlic and ginger , and then add the meat. If you have ever seen the gigantic burners they have in Chinese restaurants specifically for the stir-fry wok, they're called "volcanos" because they get so ridiculously hot.

Restaurants have extremely powerful stoves pumping out mega-high heat, which enables them to get a beautiful sear on meats and cook foods quickly so that they do not spend too much time in the pan. A sauté pan works well, too. These oils have the advantage also of being neutral-flavored, so you will taste the food and the seasonings, not the oil. If you have a high-end range, it might feature one extra-hot burner that approaches 12, BTU.

That is definitely the burner you should use. There one common mistake that rookie cooks make right out of the gate and that is adding too many things to your wok at once. Once the wok is really hot, add some oil. Which means the meat will turn gray and tough rather than brown and tender. This is true in general, not just with stir-fries.

You can marinate it during this time with soy sauce and a little bit of wine. Use the most refined high-heat vegetable oil you can find. If you have to, close the kitchen door and turn on the vent fan while this is happening.

5 Tips for Making the Perfect Stir-Fry

Not getting the pan hot enough is one of the most common problems for home cooks. Instead, set it to 6 or 7 or medium-high. Then, when you are ready to cook, remove the meat from the marinade, drain it, and pat it dry before you add it to the wok. If you have ever tried making a stir-fry at home and feel like you could have done better, well, try again. Just heat it dry with nothing in it.

It is an extra step, but your meat will be fresher. To avoid this, let the meat sit out at room temperature for 20 minutes before you cook it. Overloading your wok with meat will cool it off, and as the meat releases its juices, it will end up simmering and steaming rather than frying. But even with that, you simply do not have the equipment to duplicate what a cook in a Chinese restaurant is able to do using one of their volcano burners.

That is usually a refined safflower oil or a refined sunflower oil.