If I had to leave China tomorrow, (which as an expat is always a possibility!), the one thing I would truly miss would be Hou Guo - Hot Pot. Although I love eating barbecued lamb and sauteed eggplant, Hot Pot is my favorite because it is much more than just food. It is an experience.
Some people call Hot Pot "Chinese Fondue" and I guess that is accurate. Hot Pot basically consists of a big, boiling pot of broth and lots of plates of raw veggies and meats that get dumped in the broth until cooked. When they're ready, you fish the foods out with your chopsticks. Here's a closer look at Hot Pot components:
1 The Pot and Broth:
A Typical Hot Pot
Pots come in different styles. The one above has space for two different broths. The plainest hot pot consists of only one section for one broth. A favorite design is called "love birds." You can see that kind in the photo below.
Just as there are different style pots, there are different style broths. In the photo above, the broth base is tomato. In the center section, hot chili has been added to the tomato. Broths can be made from chicken, seafood, lamb or vegetable. Usually ginger, tomato, mushrooms, dates and other flavors are added to the broth. You can eat these additions or just leave them in the pot. Broths can be very spicy or not spicy at all. How spicy do you think this Hot Pot was?
Sichuan Style Hot Pot in Chengdu, China. The hotter the better!
Chili Oil, Dried Chilies and Sichuan Peppercorns
Sichuan style Hot Pot is one of the most popular styles. It is hot! hot! hot! Sichuan province (in Southwestern China, where the earthquake happened last year. Sichuan Chinese food is popular in the US, you might have seen it written as Szechuan.) is known for it's spicy delicious food. Some Chinese say that all the girls in Sichuan are beautiful because of the hot chilies. Sichuan Hot Pot features lots of chilies and Sichuan peppercorns. These are not your average peppercorns, however. When you eat one, you will encounter a strange sensation: suddenly, your tongue will feel numb and tingly at the same time. I don't like it but my husband loves them.
2 What Goes In:
Food waiting for the pot
The only annoying part of eating Hot Pot is getting the foods we want ordered. Most Hot Pot restaurants hand you a paper printout with all the available foods and you just pencil in how many of each you want. Great for most, but since we don't read Chinese it just doesn't work for us! If we are not dining with a Chinese speaker, we must cajole the waitress in writing down our choices for us. Sounds easy enough, but sometimes it takes some convincing!
There are so many foods that you can put in the Hot Pot. Our favorites are: mushrooms (as many different kinds as the restaurant has), potatoes sliced thin, lotus root sliced thin, cabbage or spinach leaves, noodles (we love fat noodles made from sweet potato), and a selection of meats (beef and lamb) sliced very thin. Once the pot of broth is boiling, whole plates of food are slipped into the pot. Cooking time varies according to thickness and type of food. When placing the meat in the broth, it is important to keep the chopsticks dipped into the boiling broth for a minute to kill any microbes. When the food is ready, just grab it. The meat usually goes very fast. Sometimes we have chopstick wars where we try to steal the meat out of our friend's chopsticks. I am terrible at this.
3 The Dipping Sauce:
The foods will come out of the pot very hot. Especially the mushrooms. One way to cool the food quickly is to use a dipping sauce that you can quickly dunk the food in before eating it. There are different kinds of dipping sauce, but two prevail as the most popular. One is a sesame sauce, made from ground sesame seeds mixed with water. Another is chopped garlic mixed with oil. I prefer the sesame sauce. It is faintly reminiscent of peanut butter. If you have ever used Tahini, well, this is pretty much the same thing.
Sesame Paste Dipping Sauce
Hot Pot is a communal dining experience. While nearly all Chinese meals are communal, dishes could be eaten individually. Hot Pot is something that you must eat together with a group of friends. Hot Pot encourages laughter - especially when your chopstick skills fail and you just can't get what you want out of the pot. At the end of the meal, we usually take a vote to see who gets the Hot Pot prize. Judging consists of measuring the amount of spillage between the pot and each person's plate. The more spillage, the better you do. Hot Pot meals also take a long time ensuring a long full evening of conversation and good times. This post makes me hungry. I guess I know what I'll be eating this weekend.
Another Hot Pot Meal (with Love Bird pot)
Got a question about life in China? Please leave a comment!
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Great Post GlobalGal! I just returned from Shanghai yesterday. One of the highlights of my business trip there was a dinner a "locals only" restaurant that I was treated to by my business counter-parts (now my friends). It was a Sichuan Hot-pot restaurant. I love hot food and was deemed the winner for being able to take the most heat. It was my first experience with Sichuan Peppers and was just blown away by the effect. I love to cook and not being sure of availability here in Salt Lake City brought a bag back with me (Shhh, the USDA may be listening - no I do not have any seeds in my luggage, really). I look forward to trying several recipes that I have found on the internet and sharing the "numb and spicy" experience with my friends.
Where in China are you and your husband?
May 22, 2009 at 9:36 a.m.JohnnyHville - I've gotten so used to family style dining it feels weird ordering my own plate. My husband and I went back to Spain for a holiday and ordered three dishes and had them all put in the middle of the table. The waiters were freaked out! haha
Pogofire - yes the red & white rolled up things are meats, in this case lamb. The lamb is sliced very, very thinly and then kept frozen until it comes out to the table. The wide white ribbon things are sweet potato noodles. They are so good!! My favorite noodle!
Freethinker - you are so lucky to have access to all that good food! Give the hot pot a try. I can't vouch for it, but I imagine it is difficult to mess up! I agree it is misleading to call it fondue, both because the broth is not thick at all like cheese and you don't really just "dip" the foods in and bring them right back out, you have to leave them far longer than you would in fondue. Enjoy!
April 27, 2009 at 7:54 p.m.Wow, I was driving down the street in San Rafael,California today which is near where I live and I noticed a place which use to be a mediocre thai place that now says Fondue Fusion-Hot Pot. I looked it up on www.yelp.com and it has got several reviews. Several which say it is misleading to call it Fondue. It is only open for dinner but I'm going to give it a try. From the reviews I think I am going to have to try it!
April 27, 2009 at 5:48 p.m.In the picture of the food waiting for the pot, is the red and white stuff rolled up meat? Kind of looks like prosciutto. How about the stuff on the very top shelf, looks like a wide white ribbon (trying saying that three times fast)?
I had never heard of this, but it sure sounds tasty!
April 27, 2009 at 3:45 p.m.I have good friends which are first, second, and third generation Oriental Americans (they would not appreciate the use of Oriental, but I use it here purely to distinguish as of far east Asian descent), and the thing I love the most about their culture is the family style dining.
Hot pots are FUN!!
April 27, 2009 at 10:49 a.m.