Recommendations needed for powerful tabletop burner for Chinese hotpot

[nolnacs]

Does anyone have any recommendations for making Chinese hotpot? I was at my in-laws for Thanksgiving and the electric burner they had was not sufficiently powerful to keep the hotpot boiling as we dropped in all the food. I believe that the unit they had was 1300 watts and was made by Waring.

I don't think that they want to use a gas burner on their table so that is probably not an option. Any ideas?

[Dave the Cook]

Portable induction burner?

[Joe Blowe]

Beat me to the punch!

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=induction+cooktop

[nolnacs]

I'll have to check to see if the pot they use for hotpot (it has a divider down the middle) is magnetic. If so, the Max Burton one looks promising.

[prasantrin]

Even if it's not, you can still get an induction burner. There's a special disk that you can buy to use with non-magnetic pots and pans. I can't remember how much it is--maybe $40? Available on Amazon.

[nolnacs]

So it turns out that they also use a ceramic pot at times so it can't be induction.

I've found a bunch of electric radiant ones on Amazon, but I am not certain if the 1500 watt ones will work any better than the 1300 that they already have.

[prasantrin]

edited (sorry, didn't read your OP carefully).

The disk can't be used with ceramics? I didn't read about it carefully, but perhaps it can.

eta--the disk can be used with porcelain, so I'm guessing it's OK with other ceramics. But it sounds like you're not that interested in induction burners, anyway, so we'll never know how well it works!

Edited December 1, 2010 by prasantrin (log)

[OliverB]

They sell a simple cheap gas one in every Asian supermarket here. Forget the brand, you use small gas bottles that fit inside of it and it works very well and is stable and secure. They cook samples on those in the store. I'd give that a try, the thing sells for somewhere between $10 and 20 usually and works nicely.

[Will]

Well if you don't want butane or other gas burners, and don't want induction, you may be SOL.

We've used both the Waring electric and a cheap butane burner for huo guo and both work fine, but we're also not using huge pots for either.

The cheap butane ones from the Asian market are the way to go. Seriously.

[David A. Goldfarb]

1500 watts is about the maximum you're going to get out of an electric tabletop burner that runs on a normal household plug, which is for a 15 amp/110-120 volt circuit: amps * volts = theoretical maximum number of watts. If you are close to a 220v outlet for an air conditioner or a 20 amp line that can take a 20 amp plug, you might find something more powerful that you can use from a commercial restaurant supply house.

I suspect you'll get more heat out of the butane unit, since that's what they have in the Asian markets.

Edited December 2, 2010 by David A. Goldfarb (log)

[NancyH]

Consider a butane burner from Iwatani. They go up to 15,000 BTU - almost as much as a regular home stove. Perfectly safe and appropriate for indoor use.

[jsager01]

... as we dropped in all the food.

You mean ALL the food was dropped in at the same time? If so, then you will need a very large pot, or at least one that is larger than necessary. As different ingredients require different cooking times, it can then be difficult to fish out those that cook much faster than the others. In any case, if you wish to cook all the ingredients all at once (with ingredients added at different times) then why not just cook, or at least get everything to a boil, on your regular gas/electric stove top, and then serve immediately in your favorite pot for hotpot?

For me, part of the appeal of hotpot is that it allows each person to select the ingredient(s) and cook it the way he/she likes it cooked - a very 'democratic' way of cooking and eating? (You need little wire scoops for each person). Usually each person only cooks just a mouthfull at a time, and definitely not try to cook all the ingredients for his/her meal all at once. This stretches out the cooking/eating time and encourages lots of interactions/conversations among the diners.

If i am host, then i would try to get everyone to cook in alternating sequences of vegies/precooked meats like beef/fish balls, and raw meats. Inevitably, someone would do otherwise, oh well.

I use an old electric tabletop, with an older CorningWare square casserole, and have had no problems for parties of up to 8, including 3-4 kids who have no table rights and have to eat off their parents plates.

Yes, of course, you can get those mega BTU burners.... but, why are you having a hotpot?

BTW, the divider down the middle, if anyone is wondering why, is so that you can have 2 different kinds of stock, usually a hot and spicy one, and a bland one. A kind of yin/yang.