January 2024 Part 2: Gold Hotpots + hotpot recipes

January 26, 2024

January 2024 Part 2: Gold Hotpots + hotpot recipes

Lucky Gold

Greetings, Friends of The Mala Market
 

What better way to ring in the Year of the Dragon than with a gold hotpot feast—inviting a year that's luxe, lucky and festive. 

Dragons are almost always associated with the color gold, which itself signifies royalty, power, wealth and longevity. A New Year's gift of gold is particularly auspicious, and we're adding two new gold hotpots to our lineup just in time for gifting yourself or others. 

The only thing you have to ask yourself is what kind of gold person are you?:

Do you prefer your gold minimalist and artisanal with a brushed-matte finish? Choose handmade brass.

Or do you prefer maximalist, gleaming gold with carefree upkeep? Then choose gold stainless steel

​May either pot bring you great wealth of all kinds in the new year. 

Xin nian kuai le! 

🌶 Taylor & Fongchong 🌶

P.S. While you are no doubt already familiar with spicy Sichuan mala hotpot, and perhaps the umami-loaded Yunnan mushroom hotpot, we are adding two new broth recipes to our Hotpot Deep Dive: Coconut Chicken Hotpot from Hainan Island (below) and Fermented Spicy-Sour Tomato Hotpot from Guizhou (coming to your inbox very soon!).
 
Gold Stainless Steel Hotpot
Gold Stainless Steel Hotpot
$130.00

This beautiful and unique gold hotpot makes any hotpot meal a special occasion.

Made of one piece of sturdy stainless steel, it has a burnished, bright-gold interior, a hammered, dimpled body, scalloped edges, and handles with an ancient Asian motif. It also has the perfect hotpot shape—narrower at the bottom where it makes contact with the heat and wider at the top for easy access and dipping. Up to 5 people can use the pot with ease. 

Like our other hotpots, this one is custom made for us in Sichuan by a company that makes hotpots for restaurants. 

The gold finish of the pot comes from a process called PVD that applies a super hard and long-wearing metallic coating to the steel that changes the color of the outer layer. The gold coloring is actually welded to the steel at a molecular level, giving it the benefits of being durable, rust-resistant, scratch-proof and, of course, food grade. 

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Hainan Coconut Chicken Hotpot


With this new hotpot recipe from Kathy, you can comfort your wintery self with chicken-soup hotpot while simultaneously being transported to sunny, summery Hainan Island, China's largest tropical island and home to both superior chicken and coconuts!

While hotpot has become practically synonymous with Sichuan hot and numbing broth, there are, in fact, countless versions of hotpot eaten throughout China, each suited to local tastes. (Check out the Chinese-made Netflix show The Hot Life to see what I mean about the diversity.)

This Coconut Chicken Hotpot eaten in Hainan Island is particularly unique to the locale—a clean, sippable golden broth featuring chicken and fresh coconut water and meat, which is perfectly accented by a tart, citrus-splashed soy sauce dip. 

Even better? As long as you have a rich chicken stock on hand, making the hotpot soup itself is "stupid easy," as Kathy says. Serve it alone when you feel like hotpot lite, or as the perfect mild complement to a mala broth in a yin-yang, dual-compartment pot

Brass Hotpot
Brass Hotpot
$130.00

Made to order for The Mala Market by artisans in Sichuan, this brass pot is a smaller version of the style used in upscale hotpot restaurants. Filled with soup and set over a fire, this pot becomes a richly glowing centerpiece for a special celebration. 

The streamlined design, brushed-matte brass and integrated handles provide both pleasing form and efficient function. And the substantial, sturdy weight and build mean it will last. The pot's bottom is lined on the underside with induction-compatible magnetic steel, so it can be used on induction or gas heat sources. 

We previously carried a two-compartment brass hotpot, which was gorgeous to be sure, but which, to tell you the truth, was a bit of a hassle. Because brass is a softer metal, the welding often showed up too prominently around the middle divider and where the handles are attached. We know that when you are purchasing a pricey artisan pot, you don't want blemishes and imperfections. 

That's why we have chosen a single-bowl pot as our new brass hotpot. There is no welding required on this beauty. (Actually, there is some welding on the underside where the steel plate is attached that makes it induction compatible. But the imperfections from that are all on the bottom!)

While Kathy is a big fan of the gold stainless steel pot, the minimalist brass pot will always be my favorite—and that is despite the fact that the hotpot soup can react with the brass and leave some discoloration. You can always polish the pot and restore it to its original gleam, or you can just use it as is, as upscale hotpot restaurants do. The patina of the natural brass is part of its charms. 

This is a smaller hotpot than our other models, less wide and less deep, and is perfect for 2 to 4 people, or for when you are using multiple pots to serve multiple broths. 

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Deux Cranes Collection (Milk Chocolate Ginger, Matcha Sesame, Dark Miso Almond)
Deux Cranes Collection (Milk Chocolate Ginger, Matcha Sesame, Dark Miso Almond)
$39.00
Lunar New Year + Valentines Day: Cap your hotpot celebration with Asian chocolates! Also makes a great hostess gift if someone else is cooking your CNY feast. 
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Aged Mandarin Peel (Sun-Dried Tangerine Peel, Xinhui Chenpi)
Aged Mandarin Peel (Sun-Dried Tangerine Peel, Xinhui Chenpi)
$13.00
In case you missed it: We now carry aged mandarin peel. Hello, orange chicken and orange peel beef! (Reference Kenji's The Wok for a super version of the latter.)
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