USA LCI-19008 Lci Wok w/SS Handles w, 14", Black | Pre-Seasoned Nonstick Finish, Stainless Steel Handles, Ideal for Stir-Frying, Great for Everyday Cooking

This is my favorite piece of cookware. IMPORTANT the vegetable oil based seasoning flakes off, but is hard to remove. Plan to have a wire brush to take it off. Plan to spend a very long time with the wire brush. Or to wait to have vegetable oil flakes in your food for a while. The round groves that are in the wok do not seem to make sticking an issue at all eggs slide around immediately. After striping and reseasoning the black flakes haven't come back. I don't think you have to get rid of all of the original seasoning, just spend an hour with the wire brush and then clean thoroughly. The groves are useful to hold things to the side on purpose. I am not sure how they achieved this, while also having the groves not create unwanted sticking, but they did. Things just kind of stay where you want them to stay and move easily when you want them to move. The stainless steel handles stay cool within reason. The helper handle can get very toasty, but only with long periods on very high heat. The part of the longer handle near the bowl of the wok can also get pretty toasty when long periods are used with very high heat. I still haven't needed a mit for stove top use. The part of the long handle not next to the bowl does not seem to get hot in any reasonable stove top usage. The handles are oven safe. I baked my wok at 400 for an hour and saw no issues. Take caution if you do this as this will cause the handles to get very dangerously hot. I wanted to take off a star for the hours, yes hours it took to strip this wok. They somehow made a seasoning that can't stand up to a minute with an egg, but takes hours to strip on purpose. Really this is a 4.5 star product. I can't take off more than half a star because at least the flakes are just burned vegetable oil. Something our bodies should be able to get rid of with no long term effects. The carbon steel wok is covered in some kind of varnish-like clear coating that is both clear and poisonous or at least seems like its poisonous as it stinks when it burns off. I know this because it was clear, and as a result I didn't know I had failed at taking it off. I wish it would have been red or orange, or some other color that artificial non-stick coatings are not, and yet obvious. Anyway I was much happier with this wok than that one, and even though this natural coating was extremely hard to take about half off all at once, the thing looks and works beautifully. I mean it is a real stunner. It will eventually be all black again, but right now it's about half black and copper (colored), but not splotchy. And the handles pretty much stay cool, nothing without non-stick coatings by De Buyer can come close for any amount of money. You could buy 4-5 of these pans for the cost of the closest thing that is made in France or the USA.

SIN COMENTARIOS

not bad not great just soso

This is an excellent, quality cast iron wok. I was a little sceptical about it after reading some of the reviews but I'm glad I went ahead and purchased it anyway. The pre-seasoning provides excellent non-stick cooking which combined with the very fast heating using an induction cooktop makes for a most enjoyable and satisfying stir-frying experience. I'm able to obtain that elusive "wok hei" (or smokey-charred flavour) with this wok - something I've not been able to achieve previously on my induction cooktop with other woks I've owned. It's (relatively) light weight (for a cast iron wok) and ease in cleaning (just rinse and dry) makes it a pleasure to use. The only other wok I've used that is better than this wok is my late mother's cast iron wok which has been seasoned by more than 60 years of consent use. If you're looking for a high quality and very reasonably priced (I'd venture and say cheap even) cast iron wok, then look no further as this Imusa cast iron wok is very definitely an excellent buy. It's very well made, and if you look after it and continue to season it to maintain/improve it's non-stick qualities, it will reward you with many, many years if not decades of cooking enjoyment !!

The pan comes pre-seasoned, which I presume means that they burn some oil onto it before sending it out. It doesn’t appear to have any coatings on it, as such. It isn’t as non-stick as a teflon coated pan, but I like that I can heat it very hot, without worrying about damaging any coatings. Heavier than a coat and aluminium pan, but quite acceptable.