With a variety of ingredients and soup bases to choose from, hot pot meals are one of Hong Kong people’s favourite choices in winter. In contrast to the common belief that hot pot meals easily lead to weight gain, which puts off health-conscious individuals, hot pot meals can be healthy if you make the right choices. Here are some suggestions from a registered dietitian, Chloris Leung, on how to prepare hot pot meals in a healthy way. By following these tips, restaurants serving hot pots can play an important role in promoting healthy eating.

Healthy Ingredients

Chloris recommended that restaurants make fresh and low-fat ingredients the main choices on the hot pot menu. Examples are tender beef, tofu, slices of fish, shrimps and scallops. As over 90% of Hong Kong people do not have adequate fruit and vegetables in their daily diet, Chloris recommended that hot pot restaurants encourage customers to order vegetables by making promotional offers available for trendy vegetables, such as crystalline ice plants, okra and kale. For restaurants that offer all-you-can-eat hot pot meals, Chloris suggested that they provide a healthy option based on vegetables and supplemented by low-fat meats. Restaurants can also think outside the box to provide healthy menu items. “Some restaurants offer hot pot dishes that mix vegetables with meat. Examples are ‘mushrooms stuffed with minced shrimp’, ‘lotus root patties with minced fish’ and ‘corn and chicken dumplings’,” Chloris said. In addition, restaurants can display the energy contents of different ingredients to help customers make healthy choices.

“3 Less” Soup Base

Hot pot soup bases are also closely related to health. According to Chloris, the selection of soup bases should be based on three factors: energy content, sodium content and fat. Soup bases with less fat or oil, salt and sugar include Japanese style bonito soup, kombu soup, fish and tomato soup, as well as tofu and coriander soup. She also recommended that restaurants provide a dualsided cooking pot to separate a richflavoured soup base from a light-flavoured one, thereby allowing customers to strike a balance between enjoying tasty food and eating healthy.

Low-sugar Drinks

In addition to ingredients and soup bases, beverages may contain a lot of sugar and energy. Hot pot restaurants are recommended to reduce the amount of sugar used in homemade beverages, such as plum soup, hawthorn tea, as well as chrysanthemum and goji tea. Restaurants can also provide lowsugar pre-packaged beverages, such as sugar-free tea, diet soda and lowsugar Chinese beverages, to customers.

In short, the key to having a healthy hot pot meal is to choose vegetables and low-fat meats as the main ingredients, and select two to three light-flavoured soup bases.