Babish Carbon Steel Flat Bottom Wok and Stir Fry Pan, 14-Inch

The media could not be loaded. What have you know about cooking with a skillet throw it out the window. I've made Asian dishes before however a wok is a different beast. To season wipe down the wok with hot soapy water. Then dry with a paper towel or hand towel. Next wet a paper towel with your choice of cooking oil being somewhat conservative. For me I used truffle infused olive oil. Then lightly coat the inside and outside of the wok with the oiled paper towel /towel. Then take a clean unused hand towel or paper towel and rub around the inside and outside of the wok. This is to absorb any excess or oil and make your seasoning process easier and better. You really only want a light easy coat of oil. Once this is done do you want to get your flame going. If you don't have a huge wok gas burner and just a normal house hold gas burner then I suggest taking the safety flame spreaders off the biggest burner and manually light the gas with a lighter. I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE IF YOU BURN YOUR HOUSE DOWN OR MELT YOUR KITCHEN CABINETS. Anywho If you do this you will achieve a similar style of flame that they use in restaurants and in Asia. However if you have a Viking gas stove top like I do. Removing the bottom safety (the one with multiple holes gas normally comes out of) works and I can ignite the gas however it confuses the safety mechanism and the ignitor just fires 24/7. Obviously I don't want to ruin my stove top so I just used the range as intended from the store with both safety's things in place(burner assembly)... I did tweak this later on... When seasoning AKA all the oil is applied all the excess is removed, You want to get the entire walk including the sides as hot as physically possible. If you read the instructions it will say to get it smoking. This is true however even if it starts smoking you really want it the carbon steel to turn blue all the way around. Or as many blue spots as physically possible. I say this typically takes around 30 minutes. At 30 minutes take a break or whenever you feel like taking a break and inspect your wok. If you're not happy with the amount of blue then follow these instructions. Repeat the oiling process. For me I used sesame oil the second time around. Apply at the same way you did the first time. Mind you I did not clean or wipe down the wok after the first seasoning. This is because I did not cook with it and technically it's not dirty. However I did let it fully cool down to room temperature before starting again. This time I modified *** MODIFICATION *** the burner. I only took off the top piece. This allowed at least two big flames on my burner to reach the front and back side of my wok. I follow the same steps however this time I removed the handle from the wok by twisting off the eye hook. I then wore oven mitts. And put that sucker as close to that freaking flame as I physically could. I rotated around on each of its sides multiple times for about 45 minutes. I even turned it upside down and got around the edges in the big ass fire. By the time I was done majority of the outside had tons of bluing. The outer inside did as well. I thought I did a pretty good job too. So yup that's it review finished. Nope. Next is cooking with it. And if you cook with it right it will blue more infinitely. Typically with a skillet you throw in some cooking oil or butter, let that heat up then throw in fresh garlic. They're right there is typically how most meals made with a skillet start. Because you don't put garlic in everything are you really cooking. I tried to do this with the wok, The garlic burned within 6 seconds. I immediately took my metal spoon and scraped it into the sink. There's still some bits left in the wok but that's fine. All right time to try again. I did not put as much oil in to start. However once my oil was heated up a good amount I just threw in all the beef I had lying I just threw in 4 - 2" by 2" chunks of beef (not grounded) add about 2 and 1/2 extra pounds of this beef that I was planning on cooking with. I started with four pieces to stir fry as a test to make sure I don't waste all my food. Anyway back to cooking. Immediately threw in four of those beef cubes. Once I started cooking I instantly threw in garlic. Once that was done I constantly was stiring with my metal spoon & moving the wok back and forth for probably 2 to 3 minutes. I did not try doing the flipping my food to mix it technique as I've never done it and chances are on my food's going to end up on the ground. I then started adding onion, Ginger & bell peppers. Make sure these are not tiny and about an inch long and a centimeter wide. That's minimum. Like I said before the garlic that stuff burns very fast. About 2 to 3 minutes of stiring that stuff I added the rest of my marinade, soy sauce & crush red pepper. Stired again 2-3 min. Then I added some brown sugar. And boom I was done. I want to go try it and it was delicious. Perfectly cooked medium rare. Now I had two more pounds to make. For my sake I used random chunks of beef and not steak so it was a little chewy and I trimmed it down and cut it smaller and smaller and the rest of my trials. However that's not necessarily part of this review. All right back to the review. By the time I was done emptying my pan on the first actual time cooking a large chunk of food. I had the burner turned off and the walk moved to a different section of the stove. It had already cooled down when I came back. And all the grit and grime from cooking was caked on there. I thought nothing of it and restarted the same process to cook again. By the time the wok was heated up again, adding oil then beef etc all the great grime just disappeared. And it was non-stick. You will get rid of that grain grime when you're finally done using it for that cooking session. To get rid of it as soon as you're done making your last portions turn on your kitchen sink to hot and wait till it's steaming coming out. Also while you're waiting for this to get hot take your metal spoon and just scrape the inside of your walk where the bigger bigger chunks are. It'll just collect on your spoon. Now take your somewhat hot wok To the sink and fill it with steaming hot water. ( If the water is not hot and the walk is still super hot it will warp the so and any pan for that matter.. it's not fixable) once you feel it with hot water just scrape again with your spoon on the big chunks. I did this on the inside and outside for spots that are super sticky. It only took maybe like 45 seconds. After that's done take a towel or paper towel and dry the wok. Then put it on the stove top to verify that it's dry and turn on a burner. This will remove any excess water or moisture. After that is done. Apply a very very small amount of oil to the inside and outside of the wok. Now if you're me I then turned on the burner to high heat just like I did when I seasoned it. I waited until it was smoking turned off the burner and let it cool down the room temperature before putting it back in the cupboard. No I don't know if you have to heat it back up after oiling but I did anyway because this barely has any season on it. And from what I know from cast iron skillets and cooking with seasonings baked into your skillet. The more the merrier. I think maybe after 5 to 6 times of doing it this way maybe you don't have to heat up every time. I would still though at minimum get it hot enough to try and get some of the excess oil to kind of dissipate or find better holes to hide in. Anywho that's my review is my first time ever using a wok and it went great.

I got this Wok because it was recommended from a YouTube channel called Cult Flav where they made a video reviewing a bunch of different woks. I got this Wok used in pretty good condition. Little bit of rust around the small handle rivits, might be a problem/annoying to clean but I don't think it'll be a big issue. The wooden handle is easy to remove and reattach making it really easy to clean the wok in the sink. I know some people that have reviewed this Wok have said this wok is pretty heavy but I think it's pretty light (hit the gym people. I'm just joking). But this wok does has some heft to it so that can it's retain heat to deep fry stuff. If you don't want a countertop home deep fryer, Woks are actually ideal to deep fry stuff according Kenji Alt Lopez since it actually uses less oil, high wide walls help with oil splatter and overfilling/oil rise once the food is placed in. This wok being kinda heavy to retain heat and having a flat bottom is great for at home cooks that want to deep fry food and don't have Wok burner. For seasoning the Wok, I use a mix of Avocado Oil and Flax Seed Oil. I followed the directions for Oven seasoning and seasoned it 3 times. I have not have any issues with food sticking to the Wok. Due the weight I can see this being a problem for some that like to toss their food while stir frying (Not me though cuz I'm a big strong boy lol). Overall I think this is an great all purpose wok that can be used to stir fry and deep fry food and has a easy removable handle for ease of cleaning.

In general, I haven't been impressed with products from cooking celebrities but I watch Babish and this wok popped up so I gave it a shot. I'm impressed with the packaging, build, performance, and inclusion of care instructions for the wok.Disclaimer: I'm not a wanna be chef. I just want food to look and taste good without spending a ton of time prepping / cooking.First, I was impressed with the wok's packaging. I accidentally bought an outdoor wok first and THAT wok was tossed into a big box with shipping air pillows. The Babish wok was nestled into a well designed cradle. Quality and care was my first impression.Second, the wok itself feels well built. The color of the handle is a nice shade of brown. The handle angle works fine for my stove. The rivets which connect the handles to the pan look nice and feel sturdy. I do wish the smaller U shaped handle had a covering to prevent it from getting so hot, but nothing a pot holder can't handle. The thickness of the wok feels good to me. I'm not a wok-ologist.Third, I appreciated the wok's care/seasoning instructions included with the wok. Nothing you can't Google, but again, this contributes to the feeling of a well thought out product.Fourth, this wok cooks way better than the nonstick wok I am replacing. Best looking tofu I've ever made. I'm had to increase my oil usage to prevent tofu from sticking but this was expected when going from non stick to carbon steel.I'm happy with my purchase. I rarely write this much for an Amazon review.