Successful Restaurant That Has Witnessed the Romance of a Husband-and-Wife Entrepreneurial Team

An Interview with the Founder of a Herbal Hot Pot Restaurant (My Pot) Based in San Francisco

 

 

My Pot 吾家火锅
408 Dewey Blvd，San Francisco, CA 94116
(415)665-6888
http://www.mypotsf.com

 

Hot pot, anciently named as “gudong soup” according to the sound produced when food is plunged into the simmering soup, is a cuisine uniquely invented by the Chinese people. Consumable for everybody, both old and young, hot pot can be traced back to very ancient times.

With a growing demand for healthy food over recent years, people’s appetite for hot pots has shifted to those that are both appealing to taste buds and in line with a dietary culture emphasizing health preservation. In San Francisco, a hot pot restaurant featuring authentic Cantonese herbal soup bases and dishes prepared as per exclusive recipes to offer health-preserving efficacy has risen to the occasion. The restaurant, named “My Pot”, is a family-style hot pot outlet mainly serving authentic Cantonese herbal hot pots and special snacks. Since it was open for business in October 2015, My Pot has been highly regarded among locals because of its freshness and quality ingredients, healthy and palatable dishes and high-quality services, making it a top choice for local diners.

What separate My Pot from other restaurants is its location - instead of being based in bustling streets or prosperous shopping malls, it is situated near a quiet and peaceful residential area. At My Pot, you may grab a seat, get surrounded by your family and friends and away from all trivia in your life or work, and prepare yourself for the amazingly simmering experience.

Starting Up

Ms. Chen, the founder of My Pot, was originally a complete outsider for the industry. During her high school years, she immigrated to San Francisco along with her parents to continue her education, life and career. In their everyday lives, hot pot became a must-have for home gatherings among Ms. Chen and her husbands, as well as their friends. The fascinating conversations, the heartily devouring of the delicious dishes, and the jovial and pleasant vibes among friends and relatives circling around a steaming hot pot adequately represent the “big reunion” sentiments highly cherished by the traditional Chinese culture. The hot pot has thus become a special dish which best manifests the social characteristics of the Chinese people.

 

An accidental opportunity that would eventually inspire Ms. Chen to start up her hot pot business arose. There are many reasons why Ms. Chen opted for the business of hot pot. First of all, she and her husband, as well as their friends, are all hot pot enthusiasts. Secondly, it was very difficult for them to find an authentic hot pot restaurant that can satisfy them with home flavors and vibes. Despite her countless dining experiences at local hot pot restaurants, she still felt there was something missing – the ambiance and taste of home – either in terms of the soup base or ingredients that these outlets could offer. Still young enough to have the luxury of pursuing her passion in hot pots and hometown flavors, she eventually spawned the birth of “My Pot”, a home-style herbal hot pot restaurant.

 

Decor

The restaurant is featured with a simplistic, stylish and elegant decorating style, where red walls and wood dining tables and seats highlight immense charms originating from China. The overall dining space is very cozy. The murals on the wall and the lighting decorations have introduced some trendy elements into the restaurant, creating an extremely attractive perception in diners. The restaurant mainly adopts ceramic and wood dinnerware, which can effectively prevent unexpected burns while remaining healthy and environment-friendly for use.

 

Dishes

Speaking of the specialties of My Pot, the secret that makes its hot pots stand out is their soup bases, which are made of multiple carefully-selected fresh and top-quality ingredients and herbs. Herbal dishes can be traced back to ancient times and has been broadly circulated from imperial courts to folk communities. Over the long history of the Chinese culture, herbal diets have gained vast recognition from people all over the world for their unique efficacy and features.

With secretly-made herbal soup base as its central selling point, My Pot promotes a unique hot pot culture that rejects any addition of additives or MSG. The mellow white tasty soup base is comprised of bone and chicken soups that has been gently stewed for a good long time, complemented by appropriate fresh herbs such as Chinese angelica, wolfberry, dangshen, longans, red dates, nutmeg and other herbs to create a visual, olfactory and gustatory feast for diners. There are mainly major features that can explain the popularity of the hot pot offered by the restaurant:

 

1.Fresh and delectable taste: Heated by constant fire, the simmering soup brine of the hot pot allows diners to cook their dishes which are instantly ready to eat. Not only the combination of heat and taste, but also the exquisitely prepared soup brine containing multiple interactive herbs and ingredients, adds an extra layer of freshness and aroma to the soup.

 

2.Popular flavors: By diversifying varieties and flavors, the restaurant meets demands from highly varied diners. That is also coupled with dozens of different dipping sauces that further broaden the spectrum of acceptance for hot pots.

 

3.The broad selection of ingredients: From the traditional beef offal commonly used in “beef omasum hot pots” to today’s addition of delicacies from land and sea, the varieties of hot pots are arguably countless in the restaurant. To put it simply, everything that is edible can be boiled or cooked in a hot pot, and a diner eventually finds his or her favorite match after the repeated trial of different combinations of various ingredients.

 

4.Exquisite preparation: Apart from the selection top-grade sauce, there are also many exquisite processes pertaining to the preparation of soup, processing of ingredients, provision of sauce dishes, placement of ingredients and techniques of cooking.

5.Tons of fun: The fun of eating hot pot lies in the amusing charms it evokes when relatives, friends, guests, and companions seated around a simmering pot exchanging pleasant conversations. Be it a feast or a snack, the pleasure is immense. As perfectly captured by Yan Chen, a poet in Qing Dynasty, the essence of the hot pot is “hundreds of flavors melting into a small pot on the stove surrounded by cheerful quaffing guests”.

 

6.Health preservation: The ingredients used in hot pots are highly beneficial to the human body. In particular, heavy sweating while feasting on hot pot is a proven treatment for common flu. The great variety of nutritional and healthy ingredients are also distinctly effective for mitigating rheumatic symptoms. Highly nutritional food complementing the herbal soup base of the hot pot, such as fish heads and soft-shelled turtles, helps preserve health and boost fitness.

 

Management

Eating at My Pot provides a homecoming experience. Ms. Chen, the hostess, maintains strict control over the selection of ingredients – she inspects all purchases and deliveries for the restaurant in person on a daily basis. That is especially the case with meat, which she would personally taste and verify their quality before serving them to guests. To ensure freshness and cleanness of ingredients, as well as to prevent the loss of fresh and original flavor of vegetables and meat, My Pot adopts a model in which all foods are sliced and prepared immediately after they are ordered on spot.

 

The restaurant is cleaned twice - before opening and another after closing – on a daily basis. Professional janitorial services are routinely hired to clean the kitchen. Employees at My Pot are very considerable, kind and professional: they treat guests as if they are their family members by offering thoughtful services and better-than-home experience.

 

“Success of My Pot cannot be achieved without the effort devoted by every employee”, says Ms. Chen, “there exists no hierarchy between me and my employees. Strictly speaking, they are not even employees, they are my family, at My Pot, everyone can assign others or be assigned by them to cooperate with a specific task”.

 

Success
There are no shortcuts to success, the only way is hard work. For Ms. Chen and her husband, it has been quite a rough journey in launching their business which involved selections of location, store, ingredient suppliers and registering the business license. Even in the face of opposition from other family members, she still decided to cling to her dreams. During that process, her husband had unremittingly provided immense support in manpower, resources and finance. In humble circumstances, they managed to tolerate and understand each other so as to overcome all obstacles that stood in the way of their undertaking.

Mutual efforts are a key to the success of both business and marriage. In their eyes, My Pot is something like their firstborn child. The complementary roles that they had been playing all the way have facilitated today’s success of My Pot. Ms. Chen is a sensible, kind and thoughtful woman who excels at cooking and pastry. While her husband is more rational and proficient in operations and financial management and thus has been serving as a day-to-day “head manager” of the restaurant who facilitates Ms. Chen to fulfill her dreams.

 

October 2018 marked the third anniversary of My Pot. As the first undertaking created by Ms. Chen and her husband, the restaurant has witnessed all the sweets and bitters experienced by the couple. Arguably, the business has also witnessed their love and in return, it is also the love between them that has driven the success of My Pot.

 

What My Pot offers its customers are not only a satisfaction of their taste buds, but also a sentimental remembrance of their homes. Be it highly picky food critics or plain food lovers, everyone visiting the restaurant will be able to perceive the unique pursuit of Ms. Chen for gorgeous and exquisite tastes, as well as countless memorable moments.