The Wok

[Ketchup]

Is there anyone experienced in wokking in the field?

The wok was invented to cook in places with very limited acces to firewood (China). It should be possible to prepare a meal with but a handfull of burning sticks. This looks promising for anyone who wants to prepare a hot meal with very little impact on his environment.

Is it worthwhile taking a wok on your backpack? I suppose it can also double up as an umbrella in times of rain?

 

[British Red]

Ketchup,

Sure do mate (see pictures in the "list to learn" thread). Now a little trick I have picked up is the "wok for one". I got hold of some stainless steel Balti dishes for £1 each - they make a fantastic combined personal Wok and dish all in one. If you haven't seen one, I'll post a picture tonight

Red

 

[BOD]

Ketchup,

I got hold of some stainless steel Balti dishes for £1 each - they make a fantastic combined personal Wok and dish all in one. If you haven't seen one, I'll post a picture tonight

Red

Please do even if he has seen it. thanks

 

[Toddy]

I like cooking on a wok outside, and if you can get a good lid then it becomes an even better tool. It's worth carrying if you know you'll use it more than once.
How are the handles on the small balti dish BR? The only ones I've seen had loops rather than a pan handle.

Cheers,
Toddy

 

[Goose]

I use a balti dish too, the loop handles make it easier to pack and you can fry or use as a saucepan, great bit of kit.

 

[Toddy]

My wok has a screw off handle that lets me store it easily; if anyone comes across a small one of these I'd really like to know.
Cheers,
Toddy

 

[British Red]

Pretty much what Goose said. It has got loop handles - but these are easy to manage when you are an old bloke who wears a flat cap . I keep thinking I am going to rig something with some snare wire to hang the dish on - never got round to it yet though

Red

(remind me tonight Bod if I forget)

 

[British Red]

My wok has a screw off handle that lets me store it easily; if anyone comes across a small one of these I'd really like to know.
Cheers,
Toddy

Hmmm,

Balti dish, hole, self tapping screw, bit of broom handle?

Red

 

[HuBBa]

Balti dish:

http://www.alibaba.com/catalog/10446682/stainless_steel_balti_dishes.html

for those who haven't seen how one looks

I use them aswell. And good idea on the broom handle actually.

 

[Marts]

http://www.smallislandtrader.com/kitchen_shop/brand/mermaid/range/kitchen_basics/page/2/
do Balti dishes like these

Range from 11cms to 25cms (£4-£9)

 

[andyn]

What a great idea!!!!

 

[Scally]

got to say we take in turns of taking the wok out with us and we just lose our zebra if we are carrying it for that turn our handle comes out and we just make a wedge when we are on site.

 

[spamel]

Just seen some on ebay, set of 4 balti dishes, check this link out!

 

[Gibbsy]

This wok was one of the first bits of kit that i bought.

http://www.fieldandtrek.com/product-GSI-Outdoors-Alpine-Mini-Wok-22094.htm

They are pretty well made and hide in your pack easily.

Just a quick tip.

If you are using your wok either at home or in the field and your food sticks to the bottom add a little water rather than oil as the food only sticks because of the moisture being cooked out of the food.

 

[spamel]

Me again! Another find, it would be really easy to rig up some sort of pot hanger for these use your imagination!

This page has loads of stainless kit in it, but I have no connection with any of the sellers on any of my posts, so make sure you check out the reliability of the seller, check postage as some where ridiculously high and have fun bidding but try not to outbid each other! If you post here on this thread what you are bidding for, it may stop conflicting bids!!

 

[bushwacker bob]

you can buy 'wok rings' to sit a wok on to stabilise it on a modern electric oven.
if you invert the wok over your embers,put the wok ring on top and place some more embers within the ring,you can create a field expedient bread oven.
I know someone that travelled the world with a wok as their only cooking equipment!

 

[Tadpole]

If you have a way to carry this style of wok, I’m sure with some slight modifications you can use it both a frying/cooking pan, and as a brazier/barbeque. If it were sat on a three rocks or a three two inched thick stakes banged into the ground. In fact just about any way of keeping it off the ground. It would make an ideal fire bowl.

One more than capable of filling a duel role, being used on a small open fire (in the conventional frying pan way) and cooking over an open fire without leaving the tell-tail foot print and sterile ground. The handle unscrews quite easily, (I have one myself) and it is all steel so there is no coatings to worry about. If you use only enough charcoal to cook your food, the risk of distortion is minimal.

(I’ve yet to try filling the bowl with more than a small mound of embers and stir frying (in a smaller copper frying pan) cubes of chicken in a cracked black pepper and sea salt. I found no damage (other than the total loss of “non-stick seasoning” It was easy to re-season the wok by cooking some old oil and salt in the pan till it was smoking then leaving to cool)

 

[Ketchup]

Thanks all.
However, I learned that max effect is gained when you use a genuine wok.

-Paraboloid shape (no flat bottom)
-relatively shallow
-made of dark hammered steel not stainless steel (which reverberates the heat and so is less efficient) and certainly no aluminium (clumsy and sticky)

You heat it over a funnellike chimney to obtain a single flame (heating the wok in just one point). Under these ideal conditions, it becames easy even to fry chips in just e few spoonfulls of oil. Allternatively, you can nest the bottom of the wok right into the glowing embers of your fire.

Steaming also becomes easy if you organise some kind of lid -steaming is much more fuel efficient than boiling in water.

 

[anthonyyy]

Thanks all.
However, I learned that max effect is gained when you use a genuine wok.
.

I agree.
Woks are great. And a full sized wok is so light for the size.

The only problem with this thread is that it can't be found using the search engine because of the "3 letter rule" (just like axe and saw).

 

[Ketchup]

Shal I rename it for 'wadjan' or 'wadjang', that's the Malay/ Bahasa for wok?

But then nobody would think of that