I'm sure we've all tried hot pot in our dorms at one time or another when we were in college. During my years in college, every time I came back to school from home, a few of my Chaoshan roommates and I would bring beef meatballs from home, and occasionally my family would send a few pounds of beef meatballs to school. Whenever this happened, our dormitory would have hot pot together. Because the housemates are from different places, so four years of college, we have tasted different places of hot pot, the most famous Chongqing hot pot, but also ate the sour soup fish hot pot, Inner Mongolia fat sheep hot pot, but I miss the most or our big Chaoshan beef hot pot.

Although they are all hot pots, the soup base of different hot pots is different. Beef hot pot in Chaoshan uses beef bone broth to make the soup base, while some restaurants also use water as the soup base, with a few pieces of white radish and corn cubes, and then sprinkle celery and green onion when the soup base boils. Unlike Chongqing hot pot, which is full of spicy flavors, Chaoshan's beef hot pot is light, focusing on the tenderness of the beef ingredients and never overpowering them, while the dipping sauce is also based on salsa.

After talking about the soup base, let me introduce the most important main ingredient - beef

Looking at the picture below, you will know which part of the cow is eaten in the Teochew beef hot pot:

The Teochew beef hot pot of course comes with the beef meatballs, which are the most familiar part of the beef. Authentic Chaoshan beef meatballs are made from the freshest beef thigh meat, which is pounded up and down with an iron bar at an angle and in a rhythmic manner, so that the thigh meat gradually becomes paste and sticks to your hands. Then hold the meat paste in one hand and squeeze it into shape, and take it out with a spoon in one hand, after which it is put into warm water and boiled slowly to make the meatballs slowly firm up. A friend from Guangzhou once told me, "I finally know the difference between our beef balls and your Chaoshan beef balls. Teochew's beef meatballs squirt out gravy when you bite into them after they're cooked, while ours don't." That's right, it's all made by the hand hammering method, if you simply rely on the machine to mix it, the taste is going to be much worse than the hand hammered ones. Beef meatballs whacked by hand have a solid meat texture and a soft, crispy and elastic texture, and the gravy will spread in your mouth when you bite into it, and the flavor will be even richer when served with salsa.

My next favorite is the neckren, also known as snowflake meat.

The neck is the slightly protruding part of the cow's neck, which is the core part of the meat that is most often active, and thus its taste is sought after by many, and it is regarded as the pinnacle of beef, as a good neck is often hard to come by. The neck kernel only needs to be lightly swished in the hot pot, and the tightly distributed snow-white oil blooms will deliver an excellent texture that is elastic without being fatty.

Also, the Chaoshan people favor hung long (beef spine).

Tender beef only needs to be blanched for about ten seconds in the hot pot, while hanging dragon only needs to be blanched for 12 seconds to become soft and juicy. Hang long is a long strip of meat on the back of the cow is also often eaten in the western food sirloin, fat and thin properly, basically no fat, to lose weight girls to eat a little pressure is not.

The most mouth-watering thing was the breast tenderness.

Some of my friends may think it is fat meat and dare not eat it, but don't be confused by its appearance and name, it is not fat at all! It is not fat at all! It's not fat at all! Important things to say three times. And it is also known as "cow gold", not fat, just soft tissue. Smell not only fragrant, eat up the crisp texture, very tough, chewing, chewing, beef aroma will gradually spread in the mouth, a little fat feeling are not.

Similarly, the temptation is full of positive five flowers.

Whenever you have hotpot, it must be on the menu!

The Zhengwuhua, also known as the five-flower toe, as you can see from the picture, has distinctive tendons and is located in the part of the hind leg that corresponds to the three-flower tendon, and has a crunchier and more elastic texture than the three-flower tendon. It has a delicate texture, so the requirements for knife work are extremely high. The five-flower toes need to be cooked a little longer to be tasty, and the longer it is cooked, the crisper it will be. Its texture must be tasted in person to realize how delicious it is.

Besides the ones I've introduced, there are also spoon nuts, spoon shanks, fat callus, beef lily, tripe, beef tongue and so on. It is said that only 30% or so of a cow can be made into hotpot after slaughtering, and it can't be more than 4 hours after slaughtering to the next pot, or else the meat quality and flavor of the beef can't be guaranteed, so usually many Chaoshan Beef Hotpot restaurants have their own cattle farms.

The far-famed Chaoshan beef hot pot can not be separated from the fresh meat, but also can not be separated from the master cut beef knife work, if the cut is not good, it will certainly directly affect the taste. The quality of beef directly determines the quality of beef hot pot. So, sometimes things that seem to be taken for granted, in fact, behind the scenes is a great deal of effort, just people behind the efforts made often overlooked by us.

Enjoy the flavor, and don't let down the heart of the people who made it.