I have been using a wok since some years, it is nicely seasoned and I was quite happy with it and the results.
Recently, I have started cooking some Indian dishes, and because I like my wok, I just made them in the wok. However, it seems like the tomato is removing the seasoning – there are more and more blank spots appearing. Can that be?
Is it maybe the acid in them? Or is it something else specific to the Indian recipes (I use typically tumeric, ginger, garam masala, chili, and of course garlic and onions, but I used those before for non-Indian recipes without issues).
Best Answer
From experimental evidence*: Yes. Wet and acidic braising sauces (as you have in indian cooking) that stay in the wok for a long time are quite aggressive on the seasoning. A contributing factor could be rapid thermal changes when cold, wet ingredients are added to a hot mixture.
Also, in many cases the seasoning in cookware used for sundry purposes isn't exactly perfect - there can be spots where there is very thin or no seasoning covered by carbon deposits which can be underwashed or soaked if the pan is flooded with liquid for a long time, both softening these carbon crusts and allowing the liquid to attack the metal underneath.
*An extreme example: making american-chinese style spring roll or pineapple sweet-sour - plenty of vinegar, fruit juice, tomato balanced by plenty sugar. Seen that take a significant amount of the seasoning off a cast iron wok within half an hour.