Hotpot is a very popular dish in Vietnam nowadays. Not only do people go to restaurants to enjoy hotpot, but also most families love to gather around a hot pot during get-togethers, meals, or home parties. Good hotpot is made up of many factors, but the most important one is the broth. The ingredients for hotpot are fresh and diverse, such as chicken, seafood, pork ribs, quail eggs… but to make the hotpot flavorful and attractive, you need to have a delicious broth. Let’s learn some tips to make a tasty hotpot broth so that you can impress your family and friends every time you cook hotpot!
The first step in making a delicious hotpot broth is to choose fresh and live ingredients, and then apply appropriate cooking techniques. In addition, each type of hotpot requires specific seasonings. Therefore, depending on the ingredients, you need to have suitable seasonings.
For chicken and pork hotpot, you should not use the chicken head because it will create an unpleasant smell. Instead, choose chicken drumsticks and chicken tails to make the broth sweet and fragrant. Especially for these two types of hotpot, you should only use pure chicken and pork bones without adding any sour or sweet seasonings, which can take away the natural sweetness of the broth. For chicken hotpot, you can grill and crush the dried onions and ginger, add seasonings and chicken bouillon to taste, and add lemongrass, pineapple, and tomatoes. When cooking in the hotpot, add traditional Chinese herbal medicine packets and soaked shiitake mushrooms, sa te chili sauce, and serve with coriander, water spinach, and mustard greens.
In addition, for hotpots with ingredients from livestock, you need to add grilled ginger, grilled purple onions, ginger, and lemongrass. Beef broth cannot be without seasonings such as cinnamon, star anise, fennel seeds, ginger, and dried onions. Grill the onions and ginger until they are cooked but not burned. The red peel of dried onions helps to make the broth clear and more beautiful. Also, break the cloves of star anise, break the cinnamon into small pieces, remove seeds from fennel and roast them to remove impurities, and then wrap them in a clean cloth before adding them to the broth. Usually, there is a layer of fat on top of the beef broth to keep the heat and preserve the aroma of the essential oils.
For mixed hotpot, you do not need to add Chinese herbal medicine, just serve with water spinach, various types of cabbage, and fresh mushrooms.
Seafood hotpot requires pineapple, ginger, lemongrass, celery, and sa te chili sauce… the taste depends on each family’s preference. Seafood hotpots are usually slightly spicy, sour, and sweet. For fish hotpot, in addition to pork bones, you can also add fish bones that have been deboned to the pot. For seafood hotpot, you do not need to grill and crush the ginger and lemongrass, but you should increase the sourness compared to other types. After deboning and slicing the fish, marinate it with seasonings, chicken bouillon, ginger, and crushed lemongrass. When adding to the hotpot, add water celery and various vegetables.
Cooking time for hotpot broth
When putting the bones into cold water, you need to turn the heat to high so that it boils quickly, then reduce the heat to let it simmer for a few minutes to harden the foam, and then skim it off. The remaining process should be simmered over low heat.
Depending on each type of ingredient, the cooking time for each type of hotpot broth is different. For example, chicken and pork hotpots are usually cooked for 4 – 6 hours. Beef hotpot needs to simmer longer, from 8 – 10 hours. Seafood hotpot should not be cooked for more than 45 minutes, otherwise it will become cloudy and sour.
For beef bones, especially beef leg bones, before simmering, you need to roast them at high temperature to make the broth more flavorful, clear, and delicious.
How to fix cloudy hotpot broth
Add beaten egg whites to the cooled broth, then heat it on low heat while stirring constantly to make the impurities stick to the egg whites and scoop them out.
Chop the meat (depending on the type of ingredient for the hotpot), then mix it with beaten egg whites and soaked shiitake mushrooms, which will make the broth clear and more delicious.
If your chicken hotpot broth becomes cloudy, you can add more chicken bones and simmer them to make the broth clear and more delicious.
Nothing is better than gathering around a hot pot in cold weather, especially in winter, sitting together, enjoying the hot and flavorful hotpot broth, chatting and having fun. Hopefully, these tips will help you have more delicious and flavorful hotpot broths!
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