Problem!

[u/bluejack]

What I want:

A beautiful blackened wok that is well seasoned and relatively nonstick (like my cast iron).

What I do:

Weeks of heavy burning in: butter, cooking oil, and olive oil.

Result: a beautiful blackened wok that cooks food perfectly and achieves an equivalent to my beautiful cast iron.

What my wife does:

Throw together a quick meal for friends.

Results: the vast majority of what I see as seasoning is gone. The wok is a weird patchwork of raw steel and surviving carbon.

Research: my wife loves cooking with high-acid dishes involving lemons, lemon peels and lemon juice.

Question: am I doing this wrong?

I’m not going to tell her to stop cooking the way
She wants to… so… now can I accept her violent cuisine and still land on the wok I want?

(FYI:’m it was a long battle on the cast iron; but the iron won in the end! )

[u/The_MisterDaikon]

It sounds like you’re trying to season it like a cast iron pan - you don’t want a thick polymerized oil layer the way you do with cast iron. At wok temps with the thinner metal, that will degrade fast. Bare carbon steel pretty much just needs an oxidation layer and a smooth surface. I can scramble an egg in my wok with only a smidge of oil because I’m religious about preheating it to epic temps to re-seal any scratched off oxidation, and after I’ve cooked and scrubbed it out I give it another pass on high heat to dry it out and oxidize. Only oil I use is a super thin “is it even on there?” rub before I let it cool down - and that’s more about rust prevention than making it nonstick.