Instructions: * Note: Such as Chinese cabbage, Tianjin cabbage (wong buk), hearts of cabbage (choi sum), spinach or lettuce, washed, tough parts of stalk removed, and cut into 4-inch lengths.

Combine the ingredients for each of the dipping sauces in individual bowls.

Place the steamboat with the soup in the middle of the table - preferably a round one, as all diners must be able to reach the pot in order to cook their own food.

Arrange plates of the various, uncooked foods around the pot, and place the different sauces at strategic points on the table.

The diners select their food and cook it by placing it into the boiling soup, for just a few seconds, and then scooping it out with a miniature wire basket or chopsticks. The food is then dipped in a sauce.

The soup should be maintained at a rolling boil throughout the meal. It is also best to cook the meat before the vegetables as it needs longer cooking and also imparts a flavor to the soup while it cooks.

This recipe yields 6 to 8 servings.

Comments: The Chinese Steamboat owes its beginning to the Mongols of northern China, more than 400 years ago. These nomadic peoples did not bequeath a great culinary heritage to Chinese cuisine, but the Mongolian hot-pot is a most important legacy. By the eighteenth century it had become a winter favorite in the Qing dynasty court and still remains and flourishes in all Chinas regions today.

It began as a simple way of cooking meats and vegetables. The thinly sliced meat is dropped with some leafy vegetables into a bubbling chicken soup contained in a specially designed pot (called a steamboat by the Cantonese, and a hot-pot or a fire kettle in other regions of China). It is placed in the middle of the table for finishing and serving. After a minute or two, the food is cooked and is lifted out and eaten with a variety of dipping sauces. When all the meat and vegetables are finished, cellophane noodles are added to the broth, resulting in a wonderful fragrant and flavorsome soup.

The Cantonese, ever quick to appreciate culinary worth, have adapted the Mongolian hot-pot. Here is their version.

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