Taiwanese Hotpot on Sawtelle

During my last visit to Popcorn Chicken on Sawtelle last fall I noticed an adjacent space being readied for a new restaurant to be called Flaming Pot, which I presumed would be a Chinese hotpot restaurant. I kind of forgot about that space, but they did open up shortly thereafter, and since nobody seems to have mentioned it, I decided to drop by this morning. This is a limited menu, individual prepared pot brought to your table operation. Choices include beef (below), sour lamb, stinky tofu and kim chee, among others. A bit pricey at $14 for lunch pot, $15 for dinner. Hate to be stereotypical but it looked like all the other diners were foreign Chinese students who could afford to pay. Not the greatest, but good enough and beats driving to the San Gabriel Valley. Address is 2222 Sawtelle.

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Do people really drive out to SGV for hotpot?

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Hey! Krab makes a kameo appearance!

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Well if you look at the state of WLA Chinese food four or five years ago before Qin West opened on Westwood Blvd., the Chinese students at UCLA had to be going someplace away from WLA for their Chinese food needs.
Certainly some of them were going to the SGV back then, so it’s quite plausible that some are still driving there for hotpot.

Must be those remedial ESL students at UCLA that I keep hearing about.

$15 for dinner would have been totally fine and more than fair for west side (Chinese cooks are people too, and they have to pay rent just like others), if only they didn’t put Krab in it.

chandavkl, from your photo it’s a bit hard to tell portion size. but it is pretty big right? enough to feed a hungry UCLA student and then some?

Hai Di Lao, I haven’t bothered with any other hotpot joints since they opened.

Portion is size is quite good. Bigger than your typical lunch special individual hot pot.