Chinese Hot Pot Meals by Ruth Paget
Jeff Mao writes that his family looks forward to weekly hot pot dinners like Americans do barbecue in The Essential Chinese Hot Pot Cookbook: Everything You Need to Enjoy and Entertain at Home.
Mao writes that hot pot cooking is usually done with two broths at the dining table with sauce and beverage tables set around the dining room table. You use spider strainers to dunk thinly sliced meats, greens, seafood, mushroom, noodles, and store-bought dumplings and fish balls in the broth to cook before dipping the food item in sauce to eat says Mao in his mini lesson on hot pot etiquette.
Mao continues to write that hot pot meals usually feature two cooking broths – one spicy and one mild. These broths can simmer in a cooking pot with compartments that look like the yin and yang symbol (photo in book).
Mao has 20 different recipes for broths, but the lists the following as the most popular:
1-Ma La Broth
The most popular nation-wide broth is from Chongqing in Central Sichuan Province of China. Ma La is a numbing hot and fiery red broth. This broth also contains ginger, fermented black beans, and scallions in the recipe Mao provides.
2-Mandarin Duck Broth
This broth is vegan and uses no duck. It is the usual accompanying broth to go with Ma La Broth. It is made with shiitake mushrooms, garlic, scallions, ginger, dried Chinese dates, dried goji beans, sugar, and salt Mao writes.
3-Tomato Broth
This is another mild and vegan broth.
4-Mandarin Lamb Broth
This broth is mild and is popular in Northern and Western China.
5-Yunnan Mushroom Broth
This is another mild broth with an earthy flavor Mao writes.
Mao lists 20 broths that come from around China. Two of these regional broths that appear easy and delicious include:
-Heilongjiang Broth
This broth comes from China’s northeast bordering Inner Mongolia and Russia. It is made with garlic, chives, scallions, ginger, dried shrimp, and goji berries.
-Hainan Chicken Broth
This broth comes from China’s southernmost point on the Island of Hainan. It is made with chicken, coconut water, coconut flakes, ginger, and scallions. Mao notes that the heat in the broths comes from dried chili peppers.
If numbing heat does not appeal to you, remove some of the dried chili peppers.
Mao provides recipes for 20 hot pot combination meals using basic broths along with vegetables only or with seafood and meat. An added plus is Mao’s recipe for making homemade Lo Mein noodles that only take 45 minutes to make with most of the time resting.
Finally, among Mao’s homemade sauces are some that you could use on American grilled foods as well:
-ginger-scallion oil
-Sichuan-chili oil
-chili-lime sauce
There is something for beginners to advanced cooks in The Essential Chinese Hot Pot: Everything You Need to Enjoy and Entertain at Home by Jeff Mao that makes it worth the purchase if you like Chinese food and would like a glimpse into Chinese home life.
By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
