Friday, July 9, 2010

Hungry Girl’s Guide: Posh Hotpot

Posh, according to the menu, is the “First exclusive Japanese Sukiyaki restaurant in North America.”  Sukiyaki hotpot varies significantly from Chinese or Thai hot pot as “Japanese style hot pot [is] made with Japanese low sodium soy sauce.” The soup base most people are used to is Thai hot pot or Chinese hot pot where the broth comes flavoured with many different spices. I was a bit skeptical as I am used to the robust flavors that Thai hot pot provides, not to mention the spiciness that Chinese hot pot offers. Soy sauce based broth sounded boring but what the heck, all-you-can-eat for $15.88 to a hungry tummy works for me. It being the first day of HST, saving a bit of money so I can eat more was an added incentive for me to try this place out.
Posh Hot Pot - Interior

Posh Hot Pot - Interior

Posh Hot Pot - Menu

Posh Hot Pot - Menu

The staff was extremely informative; they asked if this is the first time we were here and gave us the low down on how to order. There are two different kinds of all-you-can-eat: Signature Sukiyaki Dinner or a Certified Angus Beef Sukiyaki Dinner for $7 dollars extra. We stuck with Signature Sukiyaki Dinner, I’m not sophisticated enough to distinguish the difference between regular versus certified Angus Beef. I did however add spicy hotpot – just in case I didn’t like the regular Sukiyaki style.

Posh Hot Pot - Regular Hot Pot

Posh Hot Pot - Regular Hot Pot

Posh Hot Pot - Spicy Hot Pot

Posh Hot Pot - Spicy Hot Pot

Now their spicy pot adopted the Taiwanese style of hot pot, I’m glad I ordered it because it was quite an experience! It contained 15 ancient Chinese herbs with 4 varieties of chilies; you can definitely tell it’s spicy from the color and the aroma.

Pot Hot Pot - Satay + Chili Dipping Sauce

Pot Hot Pot - Satay + Chili Dipping Sauce

Posh Hot Pot - Vegetable Plate

Posh Hot Pot - Vegetable Plate

Posh Hot Pot - Meat Plate

Posh Hot Pot - Meat Plate

I am quite surprised, the variety of vegetables, bean curd – prepared different ways make this place very vegetarian friendly! I ordered copious amounts of vegetables and even more meat. Their thinly sliced beef is to die for!!! It’s fatty and had a kind of buttery taste to it, I guess I can compare it to Kobe beef. It was even more tasty when dipped into my mix satay with chili oil custom concoction. The waiter did tell us it was better to crack a raw egg yolk into the dipping sauce, whip it and dip the food with it. The premise behind raw egg dipping sauce according to Wikipedia is “mixing a raw egg with the condiments to reduce the amount of ‘heat’ absorbed by the food, thereby reducing the likelihood of a sore throat after the steamboat meal, according to Chinese herbalist theories.” Sure, sounds good to me but I am really not up to getting salmonella so I skipped it altogether although my dinner companion did it and he’s still kicking around.

Posh Hot Pot - Pineapple + 7-up

Posh Hot Pot - Pineapple + 7-up

Their bottomless pop selection deserves a mention; it’s not just your regular whoopity doo pop. They have pineapple and 7-up, peach and 7-up and a few other varieties. I got pineapple with 7-up and it was delightful. Even though it was bottomless, the first serving came in a huge glass so it was unnecessary for me to order another.

Posh was a wonderful surprise and I highly recommend the place. Come hungry, bring some friends and heck, it is so affordable it’s hard to complain about the bill even with the darn HST added.

Posted via email from minna's posterous