Hot Pot

Hot pot is a blast and it's different all over China.

The most common is the type where you purchase Shaved Meats like Lamb, Beef and Pork and then slice up a ton of different veggies and then boil the hot pot and throw things in a few at a time.

My favorite type of HotPot is a variation on that. My chef in YiChang taught me this one so I don't know how authentic it is but he's Chinese and he's got his own restaurant now so it must be somewhat Authentic.

Here are the ingredients you will need.

1-2lbs of Beef
OR 1/2 LB Each of Lamb, Beef and Pork Shaved.  
          (Usually you can find this frozen at an asian  
           market too.)
8-10 Potatoes
DouBanJiang - THe Stuff in the container with the
             red lid. (You can find it at an asian market.)
 OR - A bag of Hot Pot sauce.  (Also can find at asian market.)
Mushrooms
Bean Sprouts
Carrots
Baby Bok Choy
Lotus Root
White Turnips
Snap Peas
Snow Peas
Cucumber
and any other veggies you can think of.  Not Broccoli!

Once you have all your ingredients together
You will want to cut them in 1/4 inch slices.
         Look at the top picture.

If you are making my "Variation then you won't be using the shaved meat.  Cut the Beef into 1 inch squares.

Heat a skillet with oil coating the bottom to as hot as you can get it and sear the beef.  Sear it really well.  If it "dries out" a little that's ok.  I like to sear it until it's really done on the outside but when you pick one up and squish it in your fingers you can tell the inside is not quite cooked.  Basically rare for lack of a better way to describe it.

Once you have it done set it aside in a separate container and do the same thing to the potatoes.  They will be best if you pan fry them really dry.  YOu want them to soak up the hotpot juices later.

Once the potatoes and beef are done.  Combine them in a stock pot or "Hot Pot" if you bought one when you were at the Asian market cause you just couldn't resist.  They look like the pot on the right.  I like the undivided ones but usually you would serve one "Spicy" hotpot and one that looks "milky".  Unfortunately I don't have any recipes for the milky ones cause I hate them.  So good luck if you want to do a double.

Actually before you combine the beef and potatoes in the Hot Pot combine them in the Frying Pan or Wok again and add a couple heaping tablespoons of DouBanJiang.  Fry them up in the DouBanJiang for about 2-3 minutes and then put everything in the pot.  You can even rinse the WOK into the Pot.  YOu want all that oily spicy goodness in there.

Then add water to the hotpot until it's about 2/3 full.

At this point you will add Beef Bouillon and Salt to taste.  You want it to be spicy but also salty.  Saltier than a beef broth because you want the food you put in to soak up the flavors.

Once it's tasty tasting, sorry but if you don't know what tasty is you shouldn't be cooking, let it boil at a roll for about 30 minutes.  Then let it cool.  If you want AWESOME hotpot let it sit in the fridge OVERNIGHT.  It's like Spaghetti sauce it always tastes better the second time.

When you are ready to serve put it on your portable butane burner that you also bought at the asian market cause you couldn't resist.

Bring it to a very slow boil.  

Usually we eat the beef and potatoes out first and then we use the "Broth" for all our other veggies.  Throw whatever you like in it.  

Hot Pot is meant to take a couple hours to eat.  It's a blast to just sit and enjoy good company and eat and eat and eat.  

It's really good if you serve it over fresh clean steamed rice.  When you are getting to the end the rice will have all that awesome broth mixed in it and it will be a heavenly ending to the meal.  

If you have a bunch of broth left over.  Eat it the next day with the shaved meat you bought because you weren't sure which style you wanted to make.  

Enjoy!