At Nine99 Seafood House, a New AYCE Cantonese Hot Pot

It’s been comfortably chilly lately, so when I hear about a new hot pot, and a Cantonese-style one at that, I make plans with my dad to check it out.

Nine99 Seafood House opened next to Epi-Ya Boulangerie & Patisserie in the Times Supermarket lot on Beretania Street in February. My dad, who arrives first, introduces me to Christina Dong, one of the owners—he knows her through his real estate work. Which I guess shouldn’t surprise me by now since he seems to know everyone in the Chinese community.

Christina and her daughter Tiffany walk us through the menu of their first restaurant. There’s a variety of Chinese entrées and seafood, but we’re here for hot pot.

SEE ALSO: Ten Seconds Yunnan Rice Noodle Is a Different Kind of Hot Pot

Photo: Andrea Lee

AYCE Hot Pot

All-you-can-eat hot pot is $36.99 for adults (12 and up) and $20.99 for kids (5 to 12) for 90 minutes at Nine99 Seafood House. You can order hot pot ingredients à la carte, but the AYCE is a much better deal when it includes most of the menu offerings and an order of meat is $15 or more.

Four soup options are augmented by an off-menu one (it’s mushroom). We go half-and-half and pick the spicy/numb and original marrow broths.

Photo: Andrea Lee

Meats included in the AYCE are pork belly, beef and lamb shoulder. We get an order of each and head to the refrigerators at the back, where the varied selection includes your hot pot basics like cabbage, mushrooms, tofu and noodles, plus distinctly Chinese offerings like youtiao (fried dough strips) and lots of intestines. Everything is self-serve, with tongs in each basket and plates and bowls for you to load up.

While I pick out a bit of each of my favorites, my dad loads up on balls, meat and seafood. “We can eat vegetables anywhere,” he reasons, so the only greens are the ones I add.

Photo: Andrea Lee

Options at the sauce bar include soy sauce, hoisin, hot mustard, satay and sesame as well as toppings like green onion, chili, cilantro, jalapeños and garlic. A ginger sauce, like the kind on cold ginger chicken, is very yummy.

Our meat orders are waiting when we get back to our table, more than a dozen pieces per. Our broths are boiling away.

Photo: Andrea Lee

The spicy/numb broth is mala, Sichuan-style spicy, which I’m about. The spice level is manageable, the intense flavor soaks into everything—you won’t need dipping sauce—and it pairs well with seafood, though it gets saltier as it boils down, so ask for a water refill sooner rather than later.

Ultimately, I prefer the mild and wholesome original marrow broth because it lets the ingredients’ flavors shine through.

Photo: Andrea Lee

Everything tastes super fresh, including the meats. My favorite ingredients are the quail eggs, hot little bombs in the mouth, and the chewy, savory intestines. Being able to grab all the intestines I want makes this hot pot supreme. My dad likes the fish roe dumplings, which are shaped like Hershey’s Kisses and filled with little eggs that pop. And don’t miss the wide, delightfully chewy mung bean noodles and all the mushrooms.

Keep in mind that to discourage people from wasting food, Nine99 Seafood House reserves the right to charge for leftovers. Thankfully, we manage to finish most of our food.

SEE ALSO: Reader Top 5: Best Hot Pots on O‘ahu

Photo: Andrea Lee

Geoduck

Backstory: When I was growing up and my mom’s family got together for holidays, we always had a big platter of geoduck, or king clam, sliced into morsels with a spicy dipping sauce. All of us, kids and adults, wiped that plate clean. But as king clam got more expensive and harder to find, it eventually disappeared from our holiday table.

So the sight of geoduck in the tanks at Nine99 Seafood House gets me excited. It’s been years since I had some. I plan to ask what the market price is, but Christina Dong reads my mind.

Photo: Andrea Lee

While we’re hot potting, a massive tray of geoduck sashimi arrives at our table. It’s beautiful, the glistening slices layered like fish scales. The thin slices crunch between my teeth—if you’ve never had raw king clam before, the texture is like raw abalone, but with more of a clam chew. And the flavor is meaty sweet like only shellfish can be.

The entire geoduck is too much for two people, so after much back and forth with Dong, we convince her to take half back. If you dine in, the geoduck is $38.99 a pound; sold live to go, the price is $26.99. Get three or more to go, and the price drops to $22.99 a pound.

Photo: Andrea Lee

Another king clam dish arrives, this one breaded and sautéed with salt and pepper; it tastes similar to calamari but with more clam flavor. The cooked geoduck is tasty—but I prefer the pure stuff that takes me back to my childhood.

Dong tells us the outer part of the clam is served as sashimi and the inner parts are cooked, so there’s no waste. It can be prepared poached, pan-fried, in soup or other ways by special request.

Photo: Andrea Lee

It’s clear this delicacy is treated with care. In Chinese culture, the number 999 stands for eternal love. That’s where the restaurant’s name comes from—it’s dedicated to all the seafood lovers.

Open daily 10:30 a.m. to 10 p.m., 1296 S. Beretania St., (808) 888-3689, @nine99seafoodhouse