I don't know if I have written about this before.
I don't think I have.
Was it in November or December that we started heading to Paradise Hotpot at Bedok Mall for a lunchtime hotpot buffet, making it out to last three meals afterward?
Maybe.
Definitely it was the close of the year.
Definitely too it was a lovely meal, a pleasant time.
You who know me will know that I am a fan of hotpots. It doesn't matter what sort of hotpot it is, whether it has cooked food or not, or if it has fanciful meats for the taking. All I want is the meat, the veggies, the soup, the hot and cold drinks, and the fun hotpot stuff that make the meal an uber enjoyable one.
If you're wondering what it is that makes this Paradise Hotpot different from, say, Beauty In A Pot, or other hotpot brands, well, it is that here they've got a fantastic cooked food section that offers not just sides and everything, but dishes that are signatures from different districts/towns in Hong Kong.
I don't mean it being Cantonese style per se per se (although it might well be) but amongst all the sides and cooked food dishes one finds things like Fried Radish Cake from Mongkok or a dish- I can't recall what it is- from Tsim Sha Tsui. Here and there too there're mentions of places in Hong Kong like Shatin, Yuen Long, and if I'm not wrong, Wan Chai.
What dishes come from where- I don't recall- but yes, seeing them descriptions do make the feels more interesting, even if it don't matter to you which district-style of Hong Kong your Fried Rice or Cheong Fun is inspired from.
I didn't pay much attention to the heavier cooked foods of fried noodles or fried rice, but my fellow diners, especially the seniors, did.
Me being me I didn't pay much attention to what food it was they put on their plates, but definitely they were glad, and excited to be there, going round and round the counter trying to decide what it was from the selections they wanted to have.
My lunch this afternoon began with this.
At the counter I had noticed a huge pot of well-known Hong Kong street food curry fishballs, so I helped myself to three. After that I saw that they had deep fried scallops, so I got those too, and then I got a piece of youtiao which I then drizzled with condensed milk- just for fun.
I had thought this plate be the only one I'd get but later there came this, where, for some reason I went for another two deep fried scallops, one spring roll, one radish cake and one sesame ball that, to my surprise, chewy as it was, I discovered I really liked.
In between all their varieties of cooked food, I, of course, did not forget about what I was really there for- the hotpot. Today's ingredients were a balance between chicken and pork, and I think we took more of pork than chicken, although what exactly the meats were, I don't remember.
There was a fair bit of pork belly, or thin pork slices, something like that, where we took at least six, seven trays of the same thinly sliced meat.
I loved them.
They made for easy cooking into the pot of soup, which, by the way, I have not yet mentioned that I took the Teochew Style Soup Base, whilst my friend took the Cordycep Flower with Mushroom Soup Base. I loved how all I needed to do was swirl the meat a couple of times inside the pot, and I was done.
We had our meats with a homemade dipping sauce of Greek-style yogurt mixed with garlic powder, and miso. It might seem like a very savory, if not odd, combination but it actually makes for a great sauce. I don't know whether it is the garlic powder or the miso that makes the difference, but there're some probiotics in there that work for the digestion and so one gets to eat all them meats and vegetables without feeling overly stuffed or overly full.
One needs to have such accompaniments, I tell you, because it isn't just the presence of the vegetables or the other hotpot stuff themselves. The cooked food alone is more than enough.
Those two plates there might have been all I took, but at the counter they had chicken nuggets, spam fries, fried beancurd skins, fries, and mantous that you could have with condensed milk. What's more, amongst the cooked dishes there were huge pots holding seaweed soup, braised pork (like the Taiwanese Lu Rou), and baskets holding steamed siew mais and char siew baos.
All these this time I didn't take.
Instead I helped myself to the vegetables and all the other hotpot foods.
Vegetables today were all Romaine lettuce, a consistent favorite of mine which I made sure I took a lot, then there were also sotong balls and cheese tofu that I had actually not planned to take but got them anyway because I looked at all these fun hotpot foods at the counter and felt kinda silly not taking any.
My favorite were the quail eggs though.
I love quail eggs.
Always have, always will.
I like them savory, I also like them sweet.
This time I had them eggs all savory style together with the lettuce, the pork slices, and a little bit of soup.
Next time however I'll make sure to concoct a bowl that will have noodles, pork slices, lettuce, and maybe one sotong ball or one cheese tofu.
And then next time I think I might try them quail eggs in sweet dessert.
After all, Paradise Hotpot- besides ice cream soft serve and pancake- does offer a warm dessert of tau fu fa soy bean curd, and that, I think, might go very well with gently warmed quail eggs mixed between the sweet syrup and the soy.