Hot Pot

Hot Pot

Sichuan hot pot is spicy and numbing. It is chili, Sichuan Pepper corns and spicy oil to cook raw meat, intestines and vegetable. Sichuan Hot Pot was originated not from the royals but from workers in the city. Sichuan hot pot is popular due to its spicy and numbing flavor that loved by so many people. Sichuan Hot Pot is believed to be the invention of people from Chongqing and eastern Sichuan. And it is what visitors will eat when visiting these places.

Intestines were the first thing used in hot pot. In Chongqing in the 19th Century, there were many sailors worked on the boat and when their ships stopped by the pier they have the free time to do things. Making hot pot was one of the things they did. There were also porters at the pier and the porters collect cow intestines from the slaughtering house and cooked them in the boiling pot and sell them to the sailors. They cleaned the intestines and as a result, tasted really good. Chili sauce was used at the beginning. All the way to 20th Century this kind of hot pot went very popular in China. People started to cook more things such as pork, beef, etc. And today there are different versions of Hot Pot now in Sichuan, for example, Chuan Chuan Xiang, Maocai and Malatang.

At present, to make the soup in the pot, you need cow fat, salad oil, dried red chili, Sichuan Pepper Corns, sugar, ginger, garlic, scallion, cooking wine, pre-made bone soup, Dried Tangerine Peels, GMS, vinegar and several other spices. Now it is easy to buy the packaged sauce all together in the shops so you don't have to make the soup by yourself.

And there are many kinds of hot pots. But basically the hot pot is buffet and you can choose what to eat. Normally a hot pot restaurant will have the following food for you to choose from: Cow Intestines, Pig Blood Pipes, Pork Slices, Beef Slices, Goose or Duck Intestines, Squids, Fish, Different kinds of Tofu, Shrimp Dumplings, Different kinds of mushrooms, vegetables, etc. However the different restaurants feature different things for example there is Cow Intestine Hot Pot, Non-spicy Hot Pot, Yin and Yang Hot Pot, Duck Hot Pot, Chicken Hot Pot, Fish Hot Pot, Frog Hot Pot, Beef Hot Pot, Intestine Hot Pot, etc.

Each person will have a bowl of sauce made according to your own preference. There are scallion, salt, chili sauce, oil, garlic normally for you to make up your own sauce. Normally because the food is very hot so cold a drink is recommended at the same time while eating.

Hot Pot food is not limited to only one or only a few kinds of food, you can basically cook anything in a hot pot. Although you have to make sure the food is cooked before you eat. The food especially meat need to be fully cooked otherwise you can get disease. Eating hot pot usually result into a burnt mouth because it is very hot temperature. So let the cooked food cool off first before eat although this is not a problem for Sichuan people. And hot pot is not something good for pregnant women.