2018-07-02

Happy Lamb Hot Pot - Downtown (Chinese)


Happy Lamb (forrmerly Little Sheep Mongolian) Hot Pot is located at 421 Dundas Street West, in Toronto's Chinatown District, east of Spadina Avenue. Little Sheep had a bright, modern interior, appeared very clean, was air conditioned and had pleasant newer music; all of the other patrons were young people. We went for weekday lunch which is $16.99, it's $22.99 for dinner; as well there is a one-time purchase for a small pot of broth for $2 for a single person, or $2.50 for a larger sharing pot, but topping up of the broth is included and done regularly so it is not necessary to buy more than one per table per meal. Diners cook the food in the boiling broth pot in the center of the table, rather like a grill house setup. Disposable chopsticks are used, which is why I bring my own. AYCD plum juice and soy milk are included from self-serve dispensers (as well as cold water, which is a good idea as it saves wasted unwanted water being served and the time and effort of the wait staff.) There is also a salad bar and many different toppings and seasonings. Soy sauce which is found in the sauce area not at the table, was a bit salty but quite fresh and savory. Sesame peanut sauce was excellent.



The included plum juice had an interestingly smokey flavor, and was refreshing, and the soy milk was quite good, so I needed nothing else throughout. For starters, pickled cabbage was very good. Cold noodles were also excellent and Mishy loved them; they had a nice different flavor. Spring rolls were very good.


Beef was delicious and savory and we both loved it; it only takes 30 seconds to cook because it is thinly sliced. Fried tofu was excellent cooked in the hot pot. Mishy indicated the corn cobs cooked in the hot pot were amazing, broccoli had a wonderful hint of garlic (probably from the broth.) For the chicken she unfortunately dug out her mysterious "rubbery" adjective but I loved it. Chinese radish Mishy did not like; I agree it had a strange flavor that tasted as though it was about to go bad, but that is the way it actually tastes. We both agreed the dumplings were amazing (Mishy said "out of this world") and had a very nice flavor. Udon and spinach noodles were excellent and they both cook in only a couple of minutes. Shiitake mushrooms were awesome when cooked in the hot pot; it really brings out the flavor of the mushrooms. Spinach was excellent, the cooking time can be controlled so that it doesn't come out soggy and limp as spinach often is. Pork belly was good, but not as much so as when it is smoked into bacon and smoked and cooked on a grill. Taro has an interesting flavor and is a unique item which I have not seen at other AYCEs. Potato noodles don't really taste like anything and are slippery and hard to remove from the pot but I don't hold that against them.


My only complaint of the entire meal was that the cabbage leaves, although very tasty and fresh, were served whole, so were much too large for comfortable eating as no knives are provided… I guess I could have just torn them up prior to tossing them in the hot pot. I would normally state that boiling meat is close to blasphemous, but the hot pot is vindicated by its time-tested broth with full cloves of garlic, lychee-like fruits, cardamom seed pods and other large seasoning agents. Everything that came out of it was imbued with a wonderful flavour and aroma from them. It does take some effort to separate the actual food from the seasoning items so that there is minimal wastage, of course. The freshness and quality of all the ingredients to go into the hot pot was excellent.


For dessert, red bean and green tea ice creams were the only options, which I don't mind, and were good. There were also mandarin orange wedges in the salad bar which could be counted as a dessert option (they went well with the ice creams.) Mishy had never done a hot pot before and enjoyed it more than I expected she would. We had a wonderful lunch and would definitely return, and given the quality and excellence of the food, plus the included AYCD, it was an excellent value.


Rating: 9-9.5/10

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