Maggie's Birthday Steamboat

For my birthday I wanted to do something real Singaporean - go to Marina Bay and enjoy a Steamboat dinner under the stars while enjoying fabulous views of the Singapore skyline. Sounds romantic, doesn't it? Well, it really isn't that glamorous, but it is certainly very tasty and a lot of fun!

Hot pot, also known as Steamboat, is a communal dish which originates from Mongolia, but now eaten in a variety of forms throughout East Asia. It consists of a simmering pot of stock at the center of the dining table. While the hot pot is kept simmering, ingredients are placed into the pot and are cooked at the table. Around the pot there is a little grill on which you can put meat and fish to cook.

Typical Steamboat dishes include thinly sliced meat, leafy vegetables, mushrooms, wontons, egg dumplings, fish and seafood. The cooked food is usually eaten with a dipping sauce, which you can mix up yourself from various condiments on a table.

Marina Bay is famous for it's various Steamboat restaurants and many Singaporeans flock there to enjoy their outdoor dinner buffets. You get to select your items from (very clean) refridgerated display cases and then you bring it all back to your plastic table on which your hotpot is standing. It is almost like camping - families stand around the hotpot, drinking beer and chatting just like around a campfire - the cooking of the food is very sociable and communal.

We had a fun time!