My family recently enjoyed a Chinese traditional dinner that dates back over 1,000 years.
Enjoying a meal together as a family is something we don’t do enough of.
T is a picky eater, so we make his own meal and get him fed on school nights before we eat.
Weekends, going to someone’s home or eating out present less frequent times to eat together.
I wish we could do better. But I don’t lose sleep over it, because there are many other moments we spend time together and T gets social eating moments and skills at school and daycare, so we’re not quite raising a feral cat.
This past Saturday, I prepared a hot pot dinner for us to enjoy. It was all I could think about in my free time last week, as cooking has provided me much comfort as of late.
The hotpot concept is simple: “a simmering metal pot with broth boils at the centre of a table and people can add and cook all the raw ingredients they like in the broth.”
The hubby and I haven’t had hotpot in years. We usually enjoy it at a restaurant but we also own a portable cooker powered by gas canisters. We purchased it in Chinatown almost 20 years ago! It’s practically a family heirloom.
Ingredient hunting was fun.
I went to the local Chinese supermarket. I don’t often shop at these stores, so it’s fun to find ingredients I normally don’t use. For starters, there’s an entire aisle just for soy sauce!
I settled on the following menu: sliced beef, imitation crab, “lobster” balls, fish balls, Napa cabbage, enoki mushrooms, fried gluten, dumplings, udon noodles.
These ingredients were packaged as hotpot ready to cook, so I had very little prep work.
It’s way more affordable to enjoy hotpot at home than at a restaurant. Let that sink in: you’re paying to cook your own food!
The broth is the foundation of hotpot. Our pot has a partition. So one half had standard chicken broth. The other half had satay (peanut) broth, using soup base from the store. Yum!
The condiments to dip the cooked food in are also important. We used what we already had at home: soy sauce, chili oil, sesame oil and chili garlic.
You mix your condiments in a bowl with a raw egg. Dipping sauce is now ready!
The cooking part was enjoyable.
As always, we threw the meat and mushrooms in first. I threw in full stalks of green onion to richen the broth.
T was curious about the hotpot. He helped add items in. We warned him to not toss items in, because this was piping hot boiling water!
You know the best part of hotpot? It forces participants to slow down and savour the moments while the food is cooking.
Once the food is cooked, you dip it into your sauce and enjoy. Then add more food into the pot.
Simplicity at its enjoyable best!
After the meat, mushrooms and gluten were finished and when the broth had built such rich flavour, we started the final act of hotpot: we added the Napa cabbage and udon noodles.
A nice bowl of flavorful veggie udon noodle soup was a nice way to end the evening.
As I previously wrote, I’m working hard to portion control, so the hubby and I didn’t overdo it. We were satisfied but not stuffed.
So we now have enough leftover ingredients for another round of hotpot this coming weekend. You can bet that I’m counting down the days!
Oh, and I bet you’re wondering if T ate the hotpot food, aren’t you?
Are you nuts? The kid won’t even eat a fucking carrot!
He sat down at the dining table and ate a plate of spaghetti and meat sauce while the hubby and I cooked and enjoyed our meal.
And honestly, it was a perfect Saturday dinnertime spent together as a family.
This looks like such a fun way to cook and enjoy dinner together. It’s too bad T wasn’t into it, but hey, at least he sat down and ate with you. Who knows, maybe you’ll have better luck next time.
Thanks Linda! 🙂 He is definitely a picky eater and I know it’ll be a while still before he starts eating this kind of food. Slow and steady.
Good luck with reentry tomorrow and hope the week flies by for you!
So much fun for dinner!!!! You reminded me of when I was a kid and we did this with a fondue pot. There is an oil that you light then the hot cooking liquid and we dipped and cooked our food. I thought this was so cool as a kid. Yours looks so so good!!!! Thank you for sharing and for the memories.
Thank you, Diane. Fondue is a lot of fun and I’ve tried it once too. Very similar concept except it’s broth instead of cheese or hot oil. I can see how you had happy memories around it. Eating together with family or friends often create the best kinds of memories.
We love Hot Pot♥️☀️🙏 yes, it does bring the family together. It’s fun and brings happy memories. We’re doing Hot Pot actually later at home after my son is done with school. A family that enjoys food together stays together. Happy weekend my friend and make lots of great adventures.
Enjoy your hotpot meal together tonight! Hope your son is having a great time with the new school year. Have a nice weekend too!
We call it steam boat. Favorite during Chinese new year!
I love that name. Chinese New Year is certainly a great occasion to bring out the steam boat.
Great post. At first I thought it was a typo, but as I read I became more curious as to what a hot pot meal is, lol. By the way, dinner time were some of the best memories w/ my kids as they got older. I loved hearing about their days during high school 😊.
Thanks Tammy. Definitely not a typo but I could see it being confusing. 😆 I hope to make the same memories with T as he gets older around dinner time as you did with your kids. Food does bring people together!
I was thinking “crock” pot only because I’m anxious awaiting the season to change & pull mine out 😊. Have a great day!
Crock pots are the best, especially as the cooler season arrives. We’re also big fans of Instant Pot (pressure cooker) here. We’ll have to share favourite slow cooker recipes!
👍
Looks delicious! The carrot statement made me laugh. I remember that post (which also made me giggle!) 🙂
Thanks Robyn! He still won’t eat them these days. Lots of fruit in his school lunch but no veggies. 😆
That looks and sounds wonderful and enjoyable.
And I have to say I laughed out loud at your incorporation of “Are you nuts? The kid won’t even eat a fucking carrot!“😊💗😊
Thank you, LaDonna! It was really enjoyable and something we hadn’t enjoyed in many years. Will be a comfort this coming winter for sure. 😊 And yes, our T does keep us amused!
That looks fantastic. We have an amazing Chinese restaurant near by. Always went there. But it was my partner’s favourite and haven’t been since 2015. You know what, it’s time to visit again. Your photos have convinced me of that.
Thanks Gary! I hope you and Hawklad enjoy your next visit and that it is as amazing as it was since your last visit. 😊 And I hear you on food photos. I look at food photos and cooking videos way too much these days!
This post made my stomach rumble. I think I might be drooling. Please send some over! 😋
Thank you, Juliette! Not sure how good raw meat will last over an international flight. 😆 I recall when I was in London in 2013, I noticed a hotpot restaurant in your Chinatown. Maybe worth checking out if there are still those around. It’s definitely a wonderful social activity!
It definitely sounds like something I’d like to try 🙂