Hot Pot: Fon-Don't

So, China is enormous and consists of some 56 ethnic groups.  This means that the diversity of food is astronomic. Even if many of the ingredients stay the same, the flavor of different regional dishes changes dramatically.  For example, an eggplant dish in Hangzhou that was one of our staple dishes--when we went to Hunan province we ordered the "same" dish, but the taste was totally different (it was even more amazing!).

The same is true for a style of food called hot pot.  Many regions in China eat and enjoy hot pot, and many different regions have their own distinct style of hot pot.  However, hot pot seems to be largely associated with the western parts of China.

So what exactly is hot pot ? Well, it's sort of like fondue.  Except instead of tossing items into melted cheese or hot oil, you are using boiling water.  The first thing you do when you sit down at your hot pot table (usually round with a big hole in the center) is choose the kind of water you'd like to boil all your food in.  This consists of selecting the kinds of spices or flavors you want your food to absorb.  Now, you are not necessarily limited to only one, as they are able to place a divider in the middle of the giant bowl.  We usually opted for one side being super super (Sichuan) spicy.  The other half was much milder.  As soon as you choose the flavors for your pot, the waiters bring out this giant metal bowl and place it in the recessed pocket in the middle of your table.  They then reach down under the table and turn on a gas heater than begins to heat up all that water.

Hot Pot!  Look at all that food. 

The next item on the to-do list is to then choose what exactly you want to add to that boiling pot of water. Depending on the quality and type of hot pot you are at, the possibilities are endless.  You can choose from an array of veggies: several kinds of mushrooms, cabbage, bak choy, spinach, sliced lotus pods, bamboo, potatoes (to name only a few).  You can choose from a variety of meat (either thinly sliced or ground up in little balls): fish, pork, beef, turtle, bull frog.  Or lots of kinds of sea food: squid, shrimp, oysters, clams, mussels, scallops, etc.  Or other stuff like duck blood, tofu, quail eggs, or calf brains.  There's even more types of food that you can order that I am not mentioning, but I am just listing the ingredients I have personally had while eating at hot pot.

I love the meat mountain on the top. 

Once they begin to bring out the foods that you have ordered, you start chucking items into the boiling water.  We usually placed the items that took the longest to cook in first.  You toss stuff in until the water starts to get too high and then you wait about five to seven minutes.  During this wait, you meander up to a bar that has a gazillion different kinds of sauces arrayed along it.  You throw a few different kinds of sauces into the same container (like peanut sauce with garlic sauce and toss in a few chopped green onions--yum yum) and mix it all up.

To the far left is that sauce I was talking about, meat mountain in the middle, and me slow torturing a shrimp before I ruthlessly eat him. 

You take this sauce back to your table--where most of your food should be finished percolating.  You then dip your chopsticks into the pot, fish out some food, and chow down.  As you consume food, you gradually add more of the uncooked food to the water until you have exhausted your supply of food.  At this point you can either wrap up your meal, or call your waitress back over and order more.

Hot pot in Beijing to the left and center.  The right is Olivia (also torturing shrimps) at an individual hot pot.  Instead of having a huge pot in the center, we each have little Sterno heated pots with whatever flavor we want, and then we share the ingredients. 

Personally, I am not a fan of hot pot.  It is far to much hassle, especially when you are very hungry.  I have also made myself sick on it before, as (depending on the quality of the location) the quality of the food is not always that great (and one time I just ate waaaaaay too many quail eggs). Additionally, if you don't wait for some of the meats to cook all the way through, you can make yourself sick.  However, it is one of Dave's favorite foods in China, so we went several times during our stay in China, and we took everyone who visited us to hot pot--it is an interesting culinary experience for foreigners and one we did not let our loved ones avoid when they visited.

That being said, it's one of the few types of food I don't miss.