2012-12 Dinner at the Spicy Fish

While working in Shanghai, I went to a nearby restaurant called the Spicy Fish, even though we didn't know anything about it, it was crowded and busy, so figured it had to be OK.  I didn't have any locals with me, just another American.  As we were going to the table, I saw the hot plate built into the table.  We sat down and got our menu.  Fortunately there were a lot of pictures and English words, so ordering was pretty easy.  We ordered yellow catfish, noodles, vegetables and dumplings.  The cooking pan came out with tomato soup on one side and spicy broth on the other.

I started to put some vegetables in the pot and the waiter stopped me.  They would be doing the cooking.   A basket came out and when he opened it, it contained our fish--still live.  They were bringing them out for approval.  The fish were about 6" long.  They returned to the kitchen and gutted them, bringing them back out in a bowl, still wiggling a little bit.  The waiter motioned for us to hold our napkins up to our necks.  We weren't sure why he was asking, but we did it.  He then brought an oversized, clear, domed cover to fit over the cooking pot.  He proceeded to add the fish to the pot and they splashed around for about 10 seconds making a mess under the dome.  Once they settled won, he removed the dome, and had us put our napkins down.  He told us they would be done in 5-6 minutes.

After the fish was done, he placed them in out bowl and we ate them with our chopsticks, pulling as much meat off them as we could.  As we finished the fish, the noodles were then cooked.  After the noodles we had our vegetables.  The soup broth was very spicy, and made for a very good meal.  It was a good place to try and another interesting experience.