Thursday, December 08, 2011

Hot Pot

Hot water goes into the pot

Ever had an Asian Hot Pot meal?  My first was in China, back in September.  Fun!  The general idea is to cook food at the table, in a pot of boiling  broth.  In China, this method of cooking has a history of over 1,000 years.

There are variations in how this works, but here's the method I experienced:
  1. Chimney of coals with copper pan brought to table.
  2. Pour in hot water (above), bring to a boil.
  3. With your chopsticks, add the food to be cooked.  I think we did it wrong...we dumped in both meat and veggies together.  Apparently, when you start with a water base (rather than broth), you are supposed to cook the meat first.  The broth forms naturally, and then you cook the veggies.
  4. Wait until it's ready, grab out with the chopsticks and enjoy!  It was fun!
Adding thinly sliced meats to cook and make the broth

Have you had hot pot?  How did it work?

5 comments:

Marlena said...

I've only had this once and the waiters told us how to do it. It was so much fun and really tasty!

Marilyn Miller said...

I have not had hot pot, but it looks and sounds like it would be quite good.

Teafan said...

Reminds me of an Asia version of the hot broth fondue cooking, which I love!

Angela McRae said...

Never heard of this, but based on your account I'd sure love to try it. Isn't it just fascinating how different cultures prepare that one thing we all have to have, food!

Alex Zorach said...

I have yet to experience a hot pot meal. I keep hearing stories though, and it sounds like the sort of thing I might really enjoy.