Chinese Hot Pot ( Pin Lo )
Pin Lo is the perfect ※party§ piece where the guests themselves participate in the cooking. It is entirely unlike any ※hot pot§ we know, Lancashire or other. Indeed, the ※hot pot§ is the vessel in which the foods are cooked. The ideal number of guests for the ※feast§ is eight to ten and the variety of dishes. Ten or eleven different items are a very good selection. As each of them can be bought in small quantities, the cost of a Pin Lo occasion works out much more reasonably than one might think.
People participating in a Pin-Lo meal for the first time will learn in the most practical way one of the chief ※secret§ of the Chinese Kitchen 每 just how very little cooking wafer-thin pieces of fish, meat and poultry need. Each is cooked in the minimum of time 每 and this applies to vegetables, too.
If, for instance, you have never previously cooked the tender pale green leaves of Savoy or ※ordinary§ cabbage in the consomm谷, you cannot know how delicious and digestible this very often over-cooked vegetable can be . Have the leaves whole and spate. This means, of course, that you would choose a medium-small rather than large cabbage. Drop the leaves, one at a time, into the boiling consomm谷 and give them just under 5 minutes cooking. They will then be tender, but still crisp, and of a flavor which no cabbage boiled for half an hour could possibly have.
Spinach is another green which could well benefit from being given the minimum of cooking. Choose true spinach, for preference, and the ribs will not be tough. Coarser types such as beet-spinach and the ※perpetual§ or New Zealand spinach will need to have their ribs stripped and discarded and their stalks cut off in the same way as you would do for cooking the spinach in the ordinary manner.
Tender spears of sprouting broccoli can also be cooked to advantage for about 6 minutes in the boiling consomm谷.
While It was suggested ten to eleven items in a Pin-Lo party, there is no reason why five to six would not be perfectly satisfactory. The poached eggs could well be omitted since their handling and cooking call for more skill than most people can muster without a little experience.
One dish is 4oz. or so of very thin strips of fillet steak dressed with eaten egg, pepper, salt, soy sauce and a pinch or two of flour, all well worked into the meat. Another is small pieces of cleaned ink-fish ( squid ) and a third is a medium-sized Dover sole, filleted and then cut into slender slices. Then there is 4oz. pig's liver very thinly sliced 每 not easy unless you know how the Chinese cook does the job. Press one hand on the liver and, with a really sharp knife in the other, very gently cut through into very thin slices. Shelled Pacific prawns, black intestinal lines discarded , are cut into small strips. So is a breast of chicken, skin and nerves removed. On another plate, there is even thinly sliced skinned chicken gizzard, a great delicacy in China . Three to four scallops, white parts only, are cut horizontally into fairly thin slices and are on their own dish ready to be selected and cooked.
Fresh eggs and Chinese pickled ones, the latter bought ready to eat. One simply cracks and removes their outside casing of rice husks and clay, quarters the eggs and places them ready with a garnish of Chinese pickles. There are always at least two kinds of greens. In the present instance, watercress and lettuce. Finally, and very important, there are always three or four sauces from chili, mustard, onion, and ginger, plum and soy. These sauces are arranged around a pot little more than half filled with boiling rich chicken stock, resting on a lighted spirit lamp. Guests dip their cooked items in the chosen sauce.
Chopstick should be used but , for those who cannot manage them , or will not make the effort, long forks can stand in.
The procedure is this :
Each person picks up with chopsticks ( or impales on a fork ) an item which appeals to him or her 每 fish, shellfish, meat or greens 每 drops or lovers it into the just boiling stock and leaves it there just long enough to be cooked. This is a very short time indeed. Most people, at first, leave it longer than necessary but, very soon, a minute or even less will be allowed for each item. Once you have given scallops this quick treatment, it is hardly likely that you will again resort to even the short time we generally allow this delicious but much neglected bivalve.
The garnishes, as you can see, are simple 每 onion ※flowers§, sprays of parsley and quartered tomatoes.
To make onion ※flowers§ :
Cut four 11/2 to 2 inch lengths of firm green spring onion stalks, then cut down one-their way from each end.
Drop them into cold iced water and the ends will spring out into circular fringes or ※flowers§.
So far, the guests have cooked their own items, but, when the time comes for the fresh eggs and lettuce leaves, the host or hostess takes over. The lettuce leaves are carefully arranged in the stock to support the eggs, cup-wise. A raw egg is broken into each ※cup§ and poached to individual tastes.
Lastly, when all the items have been consumed, there still remains the lovely broth. Believe it or not, that glorious conglomeration of flavors s the most delicious you will ever come across.
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