Chinese hotpot is a popular communal dining experience, its not only about food its also about the experience of gartehring around a steaming pot with friends and family, sharing stories and enjoying each other’s company.
The broth is often flavored with ingredients like spices, herbs and aromatics such as ginger and garlic, imparting rich and complex flavors to the ingredients cooked in it.
Ingredients such as thinly sliced meats, vegetables, tofu, fresh noodles are some of the examples. The importance of hot pot is in part due to its consistent warmth, as it’s kept simmering throughout the entire meal.
Additionally, eating hot pot is not only a lunch or dinner; it often also serves as a social event. Because hot pot is served in the center of the table, people congregate around it.
Ingredients
Soup base options
pork bone stock,
sliced ginger,
green onions,
goji berries,
ground white pepper
Meat options
thinly sliced fatty beef slices
thinly sliced lamb meat
thinly sliced pork belly
beef balls
Seafood options
fish balls,
assorted shrimp paste or balls
fish tofu or fish cakes
fresh clams and mussels, cleaned fish fillet (cut diagonally into 1/2 inch thick slices)
raw shrimp, peeled and de-veined
Vegetable options
napa cabbage leaves, cut into large pieces
Shanghai baby bok choy, cut into quarters lengthwise yellow
potato, peeled and cut into thick slices
dried shiitake mushrooms,
fresh mushrooms,
Other options
quail eggs
eggs
tofu (any kind), slice into thick pieces
sweet potato
vermicelli
Dipping Sauce
2 tablespoons Sha-Cha Chinese Barbecue Sauce
1 teaspoon creamy peanut butter tahini
1 tablespoon sesame oil
1/2 teaspoon Chinese black vinegar (optional)
1 teaspoon chili crisps or sauce (optional)
1 teaspoon minced garlic or garlic paste (optional)
1/2 teaspoon fermented bean curd (optional)
Instruction
Soup base
For a simple homemade pork bone stock or chicken stock soup base, simmer the stock with some slices of ginger and chopped green onions for 20 minutes in a hot pot pan or sauce pan .
Then add some goji berries, a splash of ground white pepper, and salt to taste.
There are also store bought soup base options.
Neatly lay ingredients on plates according to their categories.
For seafood—like fish balls, fish cakes, fish tofu, and shrimp balls—you do not need to thaw it before hand.
Only rinse and separate them into individual pieces.
For vegetables, wash and cut according to your preferences.
Dipping Sauce
mix 2 tablespoons of Chinese barbecue sauce with 1 teaspoon of creamy peanut butter, and 1 tablespoon of sesame oil.
For optional added flavors,
add ½ teaspoon of Chinese black (Chinkiang) vinegar, 1 teaspoon of chili crisps or sauce, 1 teaspoon of minced garlic or garlic paste, and/or ½ teaspoon of fermented bean curd.
Center the hot pot on the table. If you have a countertop butane stove, put the pot with the soup base directly on top of the countertop butane stove.
If you have an electric hot pot, prepare the soup base first on the stove then add it to the electric hot pot.
Surround the hot pot with the plates of prepared ingredients.
When the soup base in the hot pot starts bubbling, add a few ingredients from each category (or whichever you prefer to eat first) to the hot pot.
The meat and seafood (like raw shrimp and fish fillets) become edible when they change color, which takes very little time.
Ingredients like beef/fish/shrimp balls and fish tofu become edible when they float on top.
Most vegetables do not require much cooking time. Tofu can either be cooked for a short period or for a long time based on personal preferences.
Dip the cooked ingredients in the prepared dipping sauce and enjoy your hot pot!
You can also serve yourself a bowl of the soup, straight from the pot, either at the beginning or towards the end.
Note that the soup does tend to become more salty as more ingredients are cooked over the course of your meal.
