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Sunday, June 01, 2008

Hot Pot House

I really like hot pot, especially on cold nights. With my friend Aleen vising Australia again, we all organised to have hot pot. It's become almost a tradition now, that we have to eat hot pot when Aleen visits.

We booked at the newly opened Hot Pot House near Glen Waverley station. We noticed that the lady owner was the same lady who owns Hot Pot King in Box Hill. Hot Pot King used to be our regular hot pot restaurant for quite some time until other hot pot restaurants started popping up all over the place. These new places offered buffets, which was much more value for money than Hot Pot King so we stopped going there.

Hot Pot House is no different to any other hot pot restaurant. It's new so is very clean. Hopefully it stays that way. The tables are much larger so there's room to put the plates of food. Also, they use an induction stove, like Little Lamb in Box Hill. This means the food cooks a lot faster.

We stuffed ourselve silly as usual. I always like the beef the most. They also had all the usual "balls", which aren't too bad. The fish balls were good, and actually tasted more like fish rather than flour.


Ambience is not bad. The crwoded restaurant didn't have overly high noise levels such that you can't hear your friends. I thought the service was fairly good, as far as these hot pot places go. Kevin may disagree but I think we were able to grab the waitresses whenever we needed anything. The waitresses also spoke English, which was useful. Usually we try to use our broken mandarin to tell them what we want.

Here we are freezing outside the restaurant for a group photo.


As an aside, we went to Pancake Parlour in the Glen for desserts. As usual, service was absolutely shocking. This time it takes the cake. Although all tables were free, they wouldn't let us sit where we wanted. Then, we were told that since we were a large group, we all had to order something. What the? When did this become a rule. Finally, we were told that if we wanted to split the bill, we had to do it before we ordered and not after. So strange, all these new "rules". If only their service adhered to normal restaurant rules of serving customers. Water had to be repeatedly asked for, drinks and food took forever and even trying to catch a wait staff for extra cutlery was a real task.

Overall Rating: 13/20, Food is ok and service is acceptable.

Scores: 1-9: Unacceptable, don't bother. 10-11: Just OK,some shortcomings. 12: Fair. 13: Getting there. 14: Recommended. 15: Good. 16: Really good. 17: Truly excellent. 18: An outstanding experience. 19-20:Approaching perfection, Victoria's best.

Xiang Ju Hot Pot House on Urbanspoon

6 comments:

  1. Patrick finally opened his eyes!!!

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  2. How come I don't see that lame Honkie sign

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  3. Patrick is always very sleepy, and late. :-)

    No Honkie sign this time. I'll make sure someone does it, just for you Anonymous.

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  4. I disagree with you thinking Kevin may disagree.

    This place is a lot cleaner. The former "Spicy Sister" woman is a lot nicer now. She learned to smile.

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  5. Estnivek, then Kevin and I are in agreement.

    Spicy Sister is a lot nicer now. She must know that business is tough now with so many hot pot places and that she has to improve her service. I did remember her smiling at us, rather than telling us off in the past and always having that angry face.

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  6. pfft, guys, the owner of Hot Pot house in Glen is different to the one of Hot Pot King!!'
    they are totally different. The Hot Pot King one is rlly mean but the Hot Pot House one is soo nice and she is very welcoming.

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