How did I strip the patina off my wok?
I do not have much experience or knowledge of cooking, but I've slowly been learning.
Today I followed this recipe: Beef Stir-Fry. Besides some vegetable substitutions, I had a bit more meat and doubled the sauce ingredients. For the acid, I used lime juice for the first half (2 tablespoons), but ran out, so I used rice vinegar for the other two tablespoons.
After the meat had been cooked, I removed it and reduced the sauce. Around that time I noticed that the patina in the direct middle of the wok had been stripped.
The seasoning on this wok was pretty good (as you can see around the edges of the center), and just this week I had made another stir-fry in it that had rice vinegar in the sauce. Since I had no issues with that, I figured it'd be OK to use lime juice and rice vinegar in this recipe.
The two main differences between what I did earlier and just now was A) earlier I used canola oil instead of olive oil and B) earlier I added the sauce last instead of first.
My gut is telling me that when I reduced the sauce, the acid stripped away the seasoning, which didn't happen before because of either temperature or length of time. However, I just am not certain.
I'm mostly interested in how I can avoid this in the future, and what to do now with the wok. Should I scrape off the rest of the patina and start over? Or just continue to cook with it normally (and more carefully) to rebuild it?
Best Answer
I am pretty sure the acidic sauce reduction attacked the seasoning. Short cooking time of acidic elements does not have much effect, but longer cooking times are usually harsh for the seasoning. It's not a real problem though. It will come back easily. Just continue cooking as usual. To avoid this, usually Chinese cooking adds the sauce at the end, and uses some starch instead of reducing in stir-fry dishes.
On a side note, I think that your "patina" looks more like burned oil/whatever than seasoning, but it may be because of the quality of the picture. Is it smooth ?
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Quick Answer about "How did I strip the patina off my wok?"
You can give the wok a good scrubbing to remove the surface rust and wipe it down with a few drops of oil on a paper towel. In general, regular use of the wok and heating it to a high temperature will prevent rusting on the outside, but be sure to heat the wok to dry the inside and outside after each use.How do you fix patina wok?
Heat the wok as described above. Off the heat, swirl in 1 1/2 teaspoons oil and 1 tablespoon kosher salt. Scrub all over with the pad of paper towels until the gumminess and rust spots are gone. Repeat as needed.How do you strip a seasoned wok?
Follow the steps below to remove all residue:How do you remove anti rust coating from a wok?
Wash the Wok vigorously, inside and out, in very hot water, using a small amount of liquid detergent and a scouring pad. Rinse and dry the Wok thoroughly. If the lacquer is still present on the Wok the surface will feel very smooth. When the lacquer is removed the surface should feel rough.How to restore a rusted wok?
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