My name is sarah, and I have a confession to make.
There was an unfortunate smelting incident with my wok recently.
I was cooking a lot of curry for a lot of people, and thought it would work as a saucepan.
It didn’t.
Well, it temporarily did, but the bottom with have channa daal on it probably forevermore, so off I trotted to the Asian supermarket to get a new one.
If you get a proper wok (and why wouldn’t you? This was like 7 quid. Branded High Street overpriced muck need not apply here), you will need to season it.
You see, proper woks never get washed, merely wiped with kitchen roll or a damp cloth. This seasoning, and consequent use of the wok, builds up a coating on the bottom of the wok which creates that lovely charred taste which is, erm, the whole point of wok cooking.
And this, my friends, is how you go about seasoning the wok.
Wash the wok well…
Dry off every last bit of water. Doing this over a gas flame makes sure it is properly dry.
Put a couple of table spoons of oil in the wok and heat over a low heat…
Start coasting the sides of the wok with the oil. Use a brush, or just swirl if you want.
The wok will start to brown a bit. panic not, that is kind of the point.
Keep heating the oil, brushing (or swirling) it up the sides of the wok. You want to do this for about 10 minutes, until the base of the wok is nice and dark in colour.
Then just tip out the oil and wipe with kitchen paper. Don’t wash it using soap, ever. If you do that the whole process has to be done again.
And whatever you do, don’t use it to make daal.
