Hot Pot Restaurant - Hai Di Lao

This great time, described below, occurred in December 2011 when TJ and Kristen came to visit us in Shanghai.

One of TJ's and Kristen's favorite meals in China is hot pot, and on a cold winter day it certainly hits the spot!  I have eaten at a number of different hot pot restaurants but this chain restaurant, originally from the Sichuan Province, is my favorite.  It's consistent, clean and affordable. (Uh, yes, that's TJ in glasses, newly purchased here in Shanghai.)

The process from start to finish is entertaining as well as nourishing and comforting. First you gather around a table that has a well in the center.  This is where the soup will go.  There is a heating element in the bottom of this well and a container is placed inside the well, on top of the heating element. We chose a combination of soups - a clear mushroom broth and a hot and spicy broth.  The soups are brought out and the spicy soup is mixed at the table.

 Here are the soups, the right is the mushroom and the left will be the spicy, right now it's just a clear vegetable broth.

 The chef opens a bag with the hot spicy mixture - chili oil, hot numbing peppercorns from the Sichuan Province, and other spicy red peppers.

 He pours in the mixture to the clear base and voila (!), hot spicy soup.

 As an entertainment treat, as well as to add some yummy noodles to the soup I ordered the "Kung Fu" noodles.  A waiter comes to your table and takes a bit of noodle dough, stretches it and begins twirling it around, using this method to stretch the noodle.  It's a bit tricky, as the noodle gets longer it has more opportunity to  hit the dirty floor.  Our guy had to use three bits of dough to get our order stretched and into the pot.  The first two hit the floor and he had to toss those away.

 On our table you can also see the items we ordered to throw into the soup.

Spinach, cauliflower, mushrooms and sliced beef and mutton. Oh and beer, lots of beer, not for the hot pot, for us!

A very satisfying meal!