Hotpot shop for more than 40 years in Saigon, 100 pots sold out in 3 hours

Located at the beginning of an alley on Cach Mang Thang 8 Street (District 3, Ho Chi Minh City), Mrs. Sau’s beef hot pot restaurant has become a favorite destination of many people over the past 40 years. The beef hot pot dish is both delicious and cheap here, making diners only need to eat once to become a regular customer.

The shop opened from 17:30, just opened, there were a lot of customers coming in. Many people were late to come late and had to go home because they ran out of tables. It is known that even though it only sells for a few hours in the evening, the shop has to prepare ingredients from 8 am. Family members, each person has a job, people go to the market to buy vegetables and meat, people prepare ingredients, stew broth, etc. But it took a whole day to open the goods.

Beef hotpot here is unique in that it is cooked in an earthen pot, this cooking method was invented by the owner, Mrs. Sau. Hot pot cooked in an earthen pot has a different flavor than a regular stainless steel pot. The fire is cooked with coal, so the heat is released slowly, the beef is soft but not tough, the broth also takes a long time to dry up and penetrates deeper into the ingredients.

The pot of broth is simmered for 12 hours to get the rich sweetness of the bones. When she first sold it, Mrs. Sau seasoned it according to the taste of the Central region, which was salty and spicy, so customers didn’t like it. Gradually, when she received many suggestions, she reduced the seasoning to suit the taste of Southerners.

Making clay pot hot pot is more labor intensive than cooking iron pot, gas stove or alcohol stove like other shops. Hand-fan coal stove takes time, must be evenly spread to large fire, broth quickly boils and retains heat for a long time.

The beautiful little hot pot filled with meat and various “toppings” placed on the charcoal stove looks very special. Sweet, rich broth. Inside are pieces of fresh beef, beef tendon, beef tongue, ox tail, etc. There are also mushrooms, vegetables, bean curd, egg noodles… A hot pot like this for 2 to 3 people is still enough to eat. Perhaps because it’s delicious and cheap, the shop attracts a lot of young people, especially students.

1 hour after opening, the shop was full of customers. Due to the limited area and limited staff, the restaurant cannot serve too many people at the same time. But even when the shop was full, there were still many customers coming and ready to wait until a table was available. Sometimes you have to wait 30 minutes to get a seat. The sight of 15-20 people standing in a long line waiting for their turn to enter the shop is very common here.

Usually, by about 19:30, at the latest by 8 pm, the restaurant has run out of 45 kg of beef. With the price from 150,000 VND/pot (serving for 2 people), every day she sells out 100 hot pot pots.

Starting to sell from the days when a hot pot only costs 6,000 VND, customers because of the delicious taste and cheap price, come more and more. There are people who eat from childhood to adulthood and still stop by the restaurant to find the old taste.