Step 1

Partially frozen is significantly easier to cut into thin slices, since it holds its shape when you cut it.

Step 2

Wash and rinse your vegetables / mushrooms. If you're using tofu (make sure it's firm), then cut it into cubes.

Step 3

Before my dad starts cutting meat (or anything), he usually puts a towel underneath the cutting board so it's more stable. Speaking from decades of experience, this helped him avoid many cuts (but not all) in the kitchen.

Step 4

This is much clearer in the video, but here are my dad's steps to preparing fresh squid for hot pot:

Step 5

We'll cut our about half of our tilapia fillets into ~1 cm slices, and marinate it with salt, cornstarch, water, and white pepper (to taste).

Step 6

My dad's epic homemade fish balls deserve their own recipe page (will be live soon).

Step 7

All we need to do is peel our daikon, cut it in half, and then cut it up into about 1 cm slices. We'll start boiling our hot pot broth with daikon, and then eat it at the end after it's soaked up all of the delicious flavors from the other foods.

Step 8

For my dad's dipping sauce, we'll be mixing light soy sauce, Shacha sauce, olive oil, sesame oil, oyster sauce, salt, sugar, chicken bouillon, chili oil, and boiled water.