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| - I consider myself a sort of hot pot connoisseur - I grew up having hot pot at home a few times a year and I've tried hot pot places around Asia and LA, where I'm from.
As the only hot pot place around (that we could find, at least), Tien Wong is really good. The meat and vegetables were really fresh and clean, which is probably the most important thing about hot pot. We opted with the Japanese Miso soup base because we don't really like the herby stuff they put in the House soup base. If you go, remember to request for the sacha or satay sauce. Sacha sauce is a staple of hot pot in Hong Kong and Taiwan. The sauce Tien Wong gives you is like a sweet soy sauce with cilantro and green onions plus a peanut sauce, but their sacha is REALLY good - better than the ones I've bought at the supermarket. Makes hot pot that much more enjoyable!
My favorite part after eating hot pot is drinking the flavorful soup afterwards. It's piping hot and has all the flavors of all the meat juice and veggies in it. I can drink the whole pot, really. After our meal, they gave us this cool sugar cane (I think) drink. It was kind of bland, but it really cools off your stomach and balances out your qi.
Service was fast and helpful, probably because they're a little over-staffed. The ambiance is rather fancy, I think, for a hot pot place, but it's really nicely decorated. The place is dim, so it's a little bit romantic, but each table is well-lit, so you can see if your food is properly cooked.
The only gripe I have about this place is that it is WAY too overpriced. Hot pot should be pretty inexpensive, and the places I usually go to give you good portions for pretty cheap prices. At Tien Wong, the portions are pretty dainty and they charge a lot for them. It's fine, though, because they sort of have a hot pot monopoly. But that's the only thing that's keeping me from going back. :(
Oh, and they don't open until 3:00 every day so don't try to go for lunch!
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