We were invited to join a cooking demonstration at the Song-Cho showroom in July, and were amazed with the variety of kitchen equipment and appliances that they have to offer. I’m sure many of us think Song-Cho just do like kitchen dish drying racks right?
Song-Cho was started in 1995 and are a local Singapore company that specialises in 304 stainless steel products. They now carry quite a wide range of items from kitchen accessories to appliances to kitchen fittings – yes, cupboards and sinks!
Anyhow, back to the cooking demo! For the lunch cooking demonstration there was:
– Fried Promfret
– Fried Vegetables
– Mushroom soup
– Chinese style soup (think it was lotus root?)
– Fried bee hoon
– Curry Chicken
– Steamed eggs
– Lychee Sorbet
Although they had prepared most of the ingredients already, they effectively cooked the entire lunch in a mere half an hour, using their appliances. It amazed me that they could whip up lunch for 20 pax in half an hour!! Imagine how impressed your friends would be if you cooked a meal for 20 friends dinner in a mere 30 minutes!
To cook the above items, they only used:
1. Ideal Wok
2. Soup Maker
3. Pressure Cooker x 2
4. Rice Cooker
After the demo, I walked away with a Song Cho Ideal Wok to try. I was really not that excited about a wok. And I’m not easily suckered, so after seeing the demonstrations, and listening to the theory about the stainless steel cookware, I still had my reservations about how good the wok could be. Initially I was a little lazy because how interesting can a wok be? And also, I would have to cook?? Ok but since I had to review the wok, I decided to give it a go.
I first tried to make fried beehoon. The recipe is more or less just:
- Heat up pan
- When pan is hot enough, fry garlic in some oil
- Throw in vegetables
- Throw in beehoon (that has been soaked in water)
- Dribble in water and soya sauce
- Wait until steaming
- Beehoon is done.
Notice there is no instruction for stirring while cooking and you can literally throw in the items. I am not kidding!
Of course, when it’s cooked, you still need to stir it up, but nothing gets burnt and it is was the easiest beehoon I’d ever made. We only cook brown rice beehoon at home, so we had to stir just a tiny bit to check that it’s cooked, and I had to cook it longer than as per recipe because I think brown rice beehoon is “harder”. BTW you can get even brown rice MEE SUA at any Fairprice these days, and it doesn’t taste like cardboard!
Ok after the beehoon I decided that the wok needed to be tested more.
So I tried frying a promfret. It worked pretty decently, except I think I didn’t have the heat high enough, so a bit of the skin stuck onto the wok. My bad. But since I also bought myself some of the Eco Cleaner, it was a breeze to clean. The Eco Cleaner seemed a little pricey, but is ALL ORGANIC and SO easy to use. Details for the giveaway are at the end of this post.
The best part about frying the fish was that you are meant to use the cover while frying. Most other types of cookware requires the wok to be uncovered, releasing all the fishy oil smells into your kitchen and entire home if you have an open concept kitchen like me, and possibly even to your neighbour’s house. If you might be wanting to make your neighbours jealous with the wonderful aroma of fried fish, then sorry this is not the ideal wok for you (hur hur).
Next I tried chicken chop, and was amazed at the results. Here are the basic steps:
- Heat up wok. No oil necessary.
- Throw in chicken (I seem to be doing a lot of throwing)
- Cover
- Do the other 581723493 things that a busy parent needs to do
- Come back after 4 minutes to turn over chicken
- Cook for another 1 minute
- Done.
I was quite amazed at how much oil I managed to get out of my chicken pieces (last photo above).
By now I was convinced that EVERY BUSY MOTHER NEEDS THIS WOK!! It is even better than, say, an air fryer, because there are less parts to clean. I’m waiting for my first generation air fryer to die so that I can throw out the bulky thing that is so hard to clean.
Other than how easy it is to use, I also like the Song-Cho Ideal Wok because:
- I also love that the Ideal Wok is so light! Who needs heavy woks? Not me TYVM. The wok has a flat base, and works well with induction stoves.
- The handles are covered with removable silicone covers which can be removed for washing
- The clear cover lets you spy on your food.
- And, since it is NOT a non-stick pan, the Ideal Wok has not been coated with any kind of chemicals. We are in contact with enough chemicals every day, so we really do not need more.
- Because no busy mother has the time to be slaving at the stove for hours when you can be multitasking doing other things right?
So how did the Ideal Wok fare against other brands? To be fair I have not tested other stainless steel woks. As compared to AMC, it is different technology and steel types (blah blah) since AMC have special dials, and some of their range even have Bluetooth. However, I did find that the Song-Cho wok burnt less and was easier to clean than the AMC! I also searched some cooking demonstration videos on YouTube and most of the other stainless steel woks do not cook with a cover, so there will be more mess if you’re going to be frying fish, chicken, etc. I don’t know who likes to do more cleaning up than really necessary. Certainly not me!
What’s more is that Song-Cho has a ton of videos on YouTube. Actually, I mean to say that they have their own YouTube CHANNEL. The Aunty in the cooking demonstration videos makes it look so easy to use, and if you’re as much a “domestic goddess” as I am (not), it will take some time to get used to it to get it right, but not any more so than other kitchen crockery.
DO LOOK OUT FOR THE UPCOMING INSTAGRAM GIVEAWAY OF 2 BOTTLES OF 250ml ECO CLEAN SOON!*
Meanwhile, you might like to read reviews of other Song-Cho products (some posts are coming soon):
- Ilovedefamily – Rice Cooker
- Kids ‘R’ Simple – Magic Quick Cook
- DinoMama – Magic Quick Cook
- Universal Scribbles – Bread Maker
- Xavvy-licious – Soup Maker
Song-Cho are having some ongoing promotions which you can find in store as well as online, including:
- IdealWok @ S$148 – Bundle deal with Induction Cooker (UP $128) = $276 (save $38) + Free Cooking Class
- Magic Quick Cook (6L S$238.40 & 8L S$262.40) – With every Magic Quick Cook purchase, get a free stainless steel powder, trivet & glass lid + Free Cooking Class
- SoupMaker @ S$199 – With every purchase of Soup Maker, get a free Dessert Maker (SC-FDM01) + Free Cooking Class.
- BreadMaker promotion price @ S$99 WEF 01 July 2017 + Free Cooking Class
- Winners have 2 weeks to redeem prizes from announcement date.
- Winner get one free 250ml EcoClean.
- To present NRIC for redemption.
- Redemption venue at main showroom only:
- No redemption possible after expiry date.
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Disclaimer: We were invited to a cooking demonstration by Song-Cho and given an Ideal Wok for review. All opinions are 100% my own.
Mummy Ed 
Are you really serious that the pieces of food does NOT stick??? And no mess coz of the cover? I would fry fish more often if there I don’t need to clean up the whole house each time!
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More or less yes it’s non stick! The wok works best at certain temperatures, similar to other stainless steel crockery, so it will need some learning, but even if anything gets stuck it comes off pretty easily especially with the Eco cleaner. Much much less mess with the cover, of course not 0% since you still have to check on the items or flip them over you know what i mean 😉 You can check out the YouTube videos to see the demonstration!
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