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| - Let me begin by saying that I had never had Hot Pot before. On the other hand, I would describe myself as being an expert in both soup and raw food, so I figured this would be a hole in one. The part that bothers me the most is that I'm sure that Hot Pot and I *are* a hole in one. Just not at this restaurant.
From the moment we arrived and they couldn't find the table we had reserved (almost all the tables were empty), to menu items being forgotten from our AYCE order, to being constantly told how much time we had left before our seating expired... this experience wasn't as famous as I expected with a name like Celebrity Hotpot.
In all fairness, we had called ahead for a table of 10 people and some of our coworkers backed out at the last minute, so we ended up being 6. The waiter seemed very confused by this and we waited a while to be seated, explaining several times that we were sorry to change our reservation last minute. They still seated us at a table for ten, and at the end of our meal told us that next time we should call them ahead of time to change our reservation. I thought that was what we did when we got there? They could have sat other people with us! They could have put us at a smaller table!
I ordered a double broth - the drunken chicken and the spicy. The spicy is hard to judge because it is so laden with spice that you cant dunk or cook anything without it becoming covered in bits and flakes of spices. Slowly moving a few of those spices over to my mild chicken broth made for a delicious chicken broth at the end. But I had to wait until the end.
Make a few sauces from their sauce bar. Experience what it tastes like to mix soy, peanut, hoisin and green onion together by your own measurements. Throw in some garlic. Maybe a dash of chilli. Taste Dat's sauce.
But with all of this said, walk in to it with weak expectations. A third of the plates we ordered didn't come until we asked repeatedly for them. Seafood portions are 1 piece each. We were given a countdown until it was time to go. And when it was time to go, as much as I was in love with the broth, I was okay to leave.
SJ
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