Hot Pot night

Another self-explanatory dish on a family night. It is not too often I do hot pot night but my brother wanted the change from our usual family bbq. Sooo, here's a simple breakdown on what we did for our hot pot event. If you aren't aware of what hot pot is, it is a primary Asian dish similar to fondue that consists of dipping vegetables and meat into a flavored of choice hot boiling pot until cooked. It is basically a stew. You cook as you eat along.
We used an electrical hot pot and burner to make our hot boiling water. Now you can create your own version by adding or taking away what you don't like. It is all about what you'd like in it. Meat, veggies, and sometimes seafood are just some of the common ingredients.
**Sauce is often a bland, a tint of salt, a savory mix of seafood paste (curry like paste) or spice if you prefer!

The purpose of this whole idea is to have the boiling hot pot in the middle of a table surrounded by vegetables and meat, therefore as you eat, you may dip ingredients and then put it into your own bowl, by adding rice noodles and the soup into one. This is a good dinner idea for a group of friends or small family to enjoy around the table as we chat.



Ingredients:

1) Veggies: Lots of spinach, green onions or scallions, mushrooms (sorted), bok choy, tofu, cilantro or parsley

2)  Coconut juice, crab paste or shrimp paste (often found in the international stores)

3) Beef briskets, meatballs, squid, baby crawfish

4) Rice noodles(optional). Boil beforehand in separate pot til tendered enough

5) hot pepper spice, salt or favorite side seasoning sauce, black pepper


Burner (propane or eletrical)

This second option is an electrical burner has two sided giving you two options of soup base. As you may tell one looks spicier than the other.

These vermicelli like noodles are doable but it is not necessary if you prefer without it. The ingredients below the noodles are coconut and a crab paste that has a great flavoring to the soup base. You may find it in your international stores. If you do not prefer it, a home base of salt and olive oil mix poured into the base works just fine. 

I hope that was a simple understanding what of hot pot is from my pictures. It was a fulfilled night with the usual gang.