Hotpot at Home

Slice Pork

This is a popular cuisine in Asia, most common from East Asia to South East Asia. Stretching from China to Korea and Japan to Taiwan, even from Vietnam to Malaysia among the ethnic Chinese, hotpot is a traditional cuisine. In the different region, the broth is slightly different. In China, the most notable are the famous ginseng soup base hotpot. Then, in Thailand, the most popular would be the tom yam flavoured hotpot. Vietnam has the pork ribs broth, Pho soup hotpot and Korea the Kimchi flavoured hotpot.

Large Size Shrimps

In Vancouver, there are plenty of choices. Because in the Asian groceries there is an array of paste for hotpot. Example is T&T Supermarket, there is a whole aisle of hotpot paste. But, if you fancy Korean hotpot. Then, any Korean grocery store would carry enough selections to satisfy your taste bud. And, it is easy to organize and have friends over for hotpot. The most important item would be a portable stove and an actual hotpot. As for the ingredients, any type of meat, vegetables, mushrooms, tofus, noodles and seafood will do.

Assortment of Fish Balls

A few days ago I invited some friends over to my place and we had hotpot. I have bought a box of thinly sliced pork and another box of thinly sliced beef from the butcher shop in Crystal Mall a few days earlier. To supplement the pork and beef, I added some fish balls, chicken meat, mushrooms, large shrimps, squid, tofus and tofu puffs for the hotpot. We also had napa cabbage for vegetables. For this hotpot cuisine, I boiled up some spicy soy bean broth which I bought from the Korean supermarket nearby.