The Drunken Pot has been in Hong Kong for almost two years now (with a newer branch located in Causeway Bay), serving up a range of hot pot broths and unique dishes. After living in Hong Kong for six years, I really want to love hot pot, so I went back to The Drunken Pot (my third hot pot experience) to give it another go. The restaurant decor is dark and modern, with plenty of tables and a small outdoor terrace. For someone who is relatively new to hot pot, the service wasn’t particularly helpful, so we winged it 99% of the time. While I could appreciate the unique flavor concepts and dishes, I did find the price-point to be high.
Vibe at The Drunken Pot
When we arrived at The Drunken Pot TST at 8:30 pm, there was still a fairly large queue outside the restaurant. Although we were seated fairly promptly, it actually took over 15 minutes before we could track someone down who spoke English and who could take our order. That being said, when we did place our order, the food came out promptly, though the staff struggled to explain the dishes to us. While I used to think The Drunken Pot was more of a “Western friendly” hot pot place, if you’ve never been to hot pot before, I would recommend going with people who know what they’re doing.
Hot Pot
We ordered one of the newest additions to their menu: The Vagabond Pot (HK$298). The pot consisted of four different broths: chicken in Chinese wine (“Drunken Chicken”), fish in beer, seafood in sake, and oxtail in red wine & tomato. My favorites were the oxtail and the spicy seafood in sake. To dunk in, we had the very Instagrammable Local Hand-cut Beef. After only a few seconds in the broth, these thinly sliced pieces of beef were ready to be devoured. Although they were cute, the pink black truffle, beef, and cheese dumplings (HK$88) were a bit of an odd combination. The simple deep-fried homemade bean curd and seaweed rolls (HK$58) were delicious after a quick swim in the broth. We also added a mushroom platter (HK$58) in an attempt to feel a little more healthy. There was a good variety of mushrooms and they soaked up whichever broth we threw them in. Finally, the handmade seven-color cuttlefish balls (HK$88) were a very interesting take on a Hong Kong classic. Personally, I’m a huge fan of fish balls, but some of the flavors here were a bit too far out (like the strawberry and carrot ones) for my liking. We also had a variety of seafood and three “fortune bag” dumplings, but at this point we were ready to be rolled out of the restaurant.
Verdict
The Drunken Pot offers more of a modern take on Hong Kong’s traditional hot pot scene. I would recommend going if you’ve ever been curious about it. That being said, don’t expect exceptional service and don’t go if you’ve never been to hot pot before, as you’re not given much help or guidance from the staff. I liked that the broth had different flavors to it and wasn’t that numbing broth I’ve had from more local hot pot joints. Finally, The Drunken Pot isn’t cheap. There were only two of us (mind you, we did leave absolutely stuffed) and our bill came to around HK$1,500 without any alcohol.
The Drunken Pot
2/F, 8 Observatory Road
Tsim Sha Tsui
Tel: 2321 9038
