When it becomes cooler and cooler, I am happy with the fact that I can eat hot pot including my favorite spicy hot pot, nourishing seafood hot pot and warm lamb and beef hot pot. I love those ideas. I am living in China now and born in Chongqing a city originally from Sichuan province, where lots of hot pot restaurants providing excellent various hot pot options.
In case, if you are interested in some hot pot culture , please move the eye to my page hot pot.
That’s too far.
Let’s start making hot pot broth (soup base). Generally there are two types of broth for hot pot, one is spicy version (Hong Tang in Chinese ) and the other is clear (mild, Qing Tang in Chinese)version.
The spiced version is based on mild version. So just focus on the first layer at the very beginning.
1. Prepare the ingredients. The picture below shows my recommendation for making a clear hot pot broth. One chicken, several pig big bones, tomato, ginger and scallion. Besides, I add celery and carrot but forget to include them in the photo. Sorry for that. You can use lamb bones or beef bones too.
2. Cut the chicken into large chunks. Clean chicken chunks, and pig bones. Cut ginger into slices, tomato into slices, scallions into sections, carrots into cubes and celery into small section.
3. Prepare a pot or wok with enough water. Bring the water to a boiling. And add chicken and pig bones in. Turn down the fire and cook the blood water out. Transfer out and wash with warm water.
4. Clean your pot or prepare another one. And add some enough water. Return the chicken and pig bones back. Add ginger slices, carrot cubes, scallions sections and tomato slices in to. Add 3 teaspoon salt or as needed.
5 Bring all the content to a boiling and then turn down the fire to simmer for around 40 minutes to 1 hour.
Then we can match some other vegetables in directly, and enjoy a mild (clean) version hot pot or staring to make a spicy hot pot broth.
The processing of making spicy hot pot broth
1. Follow the steps above to make a clear version of hot pot broth.
2. Prepare a small piece of ginger, dozen cloves of garlic, 1 teaspoon of Sichuan Peppercorn, 1 tablespoon dried chili pepper, several star anise, several chunks of cassia bark, 1/2 teaspoon of fennel and 1 tablespoon of Doubanjiang. Cut ginger and garlic into slices.
3. Prepare a wok, heat up some cooking oil. Add ginger and garlic to stir-fry for about 2 minutes. Then add doubanjiang to stir fry until you can smell the taste. Then add other spices in.
4. Pour the clear version soup base introduced above to the wok. Turn down the fire to simmer for about 20 to 40 minutes until you can smell the aroma of the spices. Then start our lovely hot pot journey.
I hope you like this recipe and Enjoy! The above two hot pot soup bases are very basic versions for homemade hot pot.
Elaine wrote a e-cookbook with my hot pot dinner recipes where lots of advanced hot pot soup bases are included. If you love to make some unique and yummy hot pot at home, this might be a helpful cookbook for you. More details, interesting ingredients and tips about Chinese hot pot soup base, dipping sauces and preparation process are all included.
Thanks. Its hard to find great hot pot recipes. I used beef and pork bones, and still came out delicious.
Even though Im not even close to being Chinese…..I LOVE HOT POT!! and so does my husband. HAHA-we just might introduce this to Mexico! We’re going later this year 😀
Thanks again
My Pleasure. Glad to know that you love hot pot too.It just totally wins my heart.
Thank you for this recipe. Although I do use a ready made base soup I like adding to it and approach the genuine Sichuan style 火锅 as closely as possible, even though I’m 老外 🙂
Hi Lawrence,
Thanks for visiting and leave me a comment. It is really great so hear that you can make Sichuan style soup base, which is definitely the best in my heart.
Real Sichuan Style hot pot soup base uses lots of unique spices in China, so I simplify the recipe for homemade versions.
Hi there,
I am Ahsan and I studied for a year in the U.K. I had many chinese friends and they introduced me to hot pot. I am a muslim and I can’t eat pork therefore can’t add pork in any form. I can only eat halal meat so can’t make hot pot with ready made spices available in market. But I will definitely try your recipe at home because I really want to try spicy hot pot which i can eat too. I hope it turns out good.
Many thanks,
Ahsan
Hi Ahsan,
If you cannot eat pork, you can use beef or lamb bone instead. I hope it turns out great on your side too.
Dear Elaine , Love your Homemade version hot pot broth simply . But i m looking for more details of professional hot pot broth because i m planing to open the hot pot restaurant soon . If you don’t mind , could you please advise me more like restaurant version broth with more herbs & fragrant would really help me out . By the way , i m from Thailand now .
Hi June,
Thanks for stopping by. It is really excited to hear that you will open a hot pot restaurant, really a long time dream for me. Restaurant hot pot recipe is much complex than home friendly version and there are more than 20 herbs and spices used. I will write up a page about Sichuan style hot pot broth, ultimate version in the next month when visit my mother and grandmother because there are lots of ingredients unavailable in the city I am currently living. Would you mind waiting me for some time? I am super happy to help.
I am very interested in knowing more about restaurant style hot pot too…did you ever write that post? Thanks
Yes, she did. But didn’t post it online, rather wrote an e-book ready to purchase.
I was searching for hot pot and soup recipes and found your site. I love hot pot, fragrant and spicy soups and appreciate your recipes and your stories. Thank you so much. I’m lookIng forward to your next article about Sichuan style hot pot for restaurants.
Hi Elaine,
In your “How to make Hot Pot Broth” you use the expression “cook the blood water out”. I have not heard this expression before. What does it mean?
Regards
Rebecca
Hi Rebecca,
This cooking method is very common in Chinese cuisine. We call it 血水 in Chinese but I guess impurities might be a better description. Those impurities will present as forms after boiling. For bones, this is highly recommended for a pure and oddness free taste.
Hi amazing Hot pot soup appreciate you …Iam planning hotspot restaurant in India I want a traditional recipes for hotspot like name of herbs used in this process ..can you help me from this
Hi Vasu,
The traditional herbs used in restaurant style hot pot is quite complex usually around 20 types. My hot pot cookbook will come soon and I will explain everything about Sichuan hot pot seasonings in that book.
hi,
I bought your Hot pot E-book and I have this question: you explain on page 13 how to make the Ma La Hot Pot soup base paste and on page 14 how to make the Ma La Hot Pot soup base. Now how much stock do you add to make the soup base ? You say use add stock or water but how much ? And do you the Clear Stock made with chicken and pork bones ?
Hi Jan,
If you plan to make hot pot at home, you need to prepare more stock. Usually we need 2L to 3L stock at the beginning based on your container. And during the process, you will need to add the stock to keep the hot pot a reasonable broth level. So I would recommend preparing at least 5L stock.
Hi Elaine,
Thank you. Yes, I want to make hot pot at home. In fact I want to give it as a birthday present for a friend.
In your book you (page 14) you say that you take 1/2 cup Ma La Hot Pot seasonings for preparing the Soup Base. Would that be good enough for 5L Soup Base ??
My second question is: would you use the Clear Soup (page 8 of your book) for preparing the Ma La Hot Pot or would you use some other stock ?
Hi Jan,
Sorry for the late reply. Use 1/2 cup of the seasonings with around 2 to 2.5 L stock at the first time and then you need to keep adding the stock to keep a depth about 5-6cm.
Or maybe I should ask how much of the Ma la Hot seasonings is required for 5L Soup Base ?
Hi Elaine
Could you please answer My questions. Much appreciated
hi Elaine
I hope I know understand. I think you say I should make 5 liter of Clear Stock. Then mix about 2-2.5 liter of the Clear Stock with the 1/2 cup of Ma La Hot Pot seasonings and leave the other half of the Clear Stock unmixed. Then you serve the Hot Pot and I should keep the level of the Hot Pot at about 5-6 cm and add Clear Stock when needed. Is this right ?
Or do you mean mix 2.5 Liter of stock with Ma La Hot Pot seasonings, serve that and mix another 1/2 cup of seasonings with the remainder of the stock for adding more soup base when needed ?
hi, I enjoy reading your writing.
I am currently working on the translation a few recipe about hot pot.
Would you mind telling me how to put “原汤火锅” into English?
Thanks
Hi,
The translation of “原汤” actually depending on the what kind of meat you use for the soup base.