Following up on my article a few weeks ago on hot pot wine pairings, I decided to do an article on hot pot etiquette and tips.
Hot pot is a popular style of eating in many Asian cultures where a variety of raw ingredients are cooked in a pot of boiling water, broth or other soup-based liquid. You are seeing more hot pot restaurants in Richmond and the variety of hot pot restaurants is also increasing. Hot pot is very communal and really fun as you can have many of different ingredients in the same meal. But there are some unwritten rules for hot pot that I hope to highlight in this article:
1. Communal vs. Personal utensils – one of the most basic rules of hot pot is that you must keep your communal and personal utensils separate. At most hot pot restaurants, they will give you 2 sets of chopsticks: one light-coloured and one dark-coloured (silver, red or black). You should use the dark-coloured chopstick to handle communal ingredients and then use the light-coloured chopsticks to eat. Do not mix up the communal chopsticks with your personal chopsticks! This is especially true during COVID and you will get uneasy looks from your fellow foodies if you indiscriminately use your personal chopsticks to handle communal ingredients. It takes some getting used to but even if you make a mistake, just ask the waiter to replace the chopstick you intermingled.
2. Don’t put everything in at once – one faux pas I see quite often is people put all the ingredients they have ordered into the hot pot at the same time. This is a clear sign of a beginner hot pot eater! This is not the correct way to enjoy hot pot because if you put everything in at once, it will take longer for the hot pot to boil and cook the food. Also, each type of food has different cooking times so it is hard to determine if you have over cooked or under cooked any given item. Hot pot is meant to be enjoyed at a leisurely pace so just put one or two items in at a time. After cooking your ingredient, take the ingredient out with your communal chopsticks, eat with your personal chopsticks and then start cooking the next ingredient.
3. The order of food ingredients – there is an unwritten order as to what ingredients are put into the hot pot first. Generally, you will start with meat or fish balls and tofu items. Then, you go to your main ingredients (slices of meat or seafood) and then finally, you finish with vegetables and noodles. If you put in the vegetables too soon, the vegetables will not be able to soak up the flavour and complexity of the broth that is created from boiling the other ingredients that you cook first.
4. Lamb – lamb is a very divisive meat in hot pot circles. Some people find lamb very pungent and claim that once lamb is put into the hot pot, it covers the flavors of everything else. If you are sharing one hot pot with others, it is polite to ask if anyone has an aversion to lamb. If so, then you may have to either section off the hot pot or wait until the very end to put in the lamb. We are fortunate in Richmond to have Happy Lamb Hot Pot location, which claims to have created a broth that removes the aroma of lamb from the hot pot. See my review of this restaurant on my YouTube channel.
Richmond also has high end hot pot establishments. One of them, which is located inside Lansdowne Mall, is called The Dolar Shop. The Dolar Shop might be too adventurous for people trying hot pot for the first time but if you want an upscale experience, it may be your place. Please see my review of this restaurant here. Until next time, keep safe!
Tony Kwan is the Richmond News' new columnist. Lawyer by day, food and wine lover by night, Kwan is an epicurean who writes about wine, food and enjoying all that life has to offer.
