Hot Pot Night 

Serves 6

Start a New Year’s Eve tradition that will even outdo those new years smooches. Gather together with a handful of your least picky friends and create a potluck meal around a hot pot table!

While we still rely on slices of pork and beef to round out our soupy feast, we look to our own mussels, clams, and dungeness crab for our favorite bites of the evening.  So, whether or not you manage to cook up our own broth, buy a pack of seasoning from several formidable brands, let us walk you through how to set up a seafood-centric hotpot dinner for an intimate group of loved one. 

Supplies:

• First and foremost, invest in a tabletop, butane burner- you can grab one at your local Asian grocery for under $50, or shop for a luxury version for much more, but we love our Uwajimaya purchased burner.

• Butane cans- don’t run out midmeal!

• A split pot is somewhat optional but if anyone of your guests has an aversion to spice or any allergies, it’s a nice, thoughtful touch to keep a spicy and mild side of soup for variety 

• 2 ladels

• Ingredients:
• 12 cups of hot pot seasoned broth
• 1 lb mussels, washed and debearded
• 1 lb manila clams, washed
• ½ dungeness crab, cooked and cleaned
• 1 brick fried tofu
• 5 bushels of baby bok choi, halved
• 2 cups of your mushrooms of choice 
• Soy cured eggs (not a traditional component but one we love)
• 1 cup mung bean sprouts, 
• ½ log of fishcakes, sliced
• 2 cups cooked noodles, a variety of your choosing 
• Chili oil 

Simply heat your hotpot broth and decide if you’re seasoning one side spicer than the other. If so, separate the broth into two equal portions and spice half the broth. Place a pot of broth over your butane burner and flick the burner on. Remember, you don’t want the heat under the soup to be piping hot, rather look to find the gentle simmer under the pot and adjust throughout your evening to maintain an even boil. 

First place desired hot pot ingredients other than your shellfish into the pot and allow to cook before adding shellfish to the pot but only as much as you’re ready to eat in your next bowl of soup. 

Allow clams and mussels to open and for broth to seep into the flesh of the crabmeat. Ladle yourself bowls of soup while you refill broth levels as the night progresses.