Dongtan hotpot half-and-half broth for two: Lao Chongqing Hotpot

Authentic Chongqing hotpot in Dongtan: Lao Chongqing Hotpot

I'm someone who needs a regular hotpot fix haha. The famous hotpot chains always have such long waits and are far away, so it's hard to visit them — but then I found out there's a Lao Chongqing Hotpot in Dongtan and went to check it out. It turned out to be a place where you can properly taste authentic Chinese-style hotpot, and I came back way more satisfied than I expected. Lao Chongqing Hotpot, a great hotpot spot in Dongtan.

• 🏠 172 Dongtanbanseok-ro, Dongtan-gu, Hwaseong-si, Gyeonggi-do, South Korea, Units 149, 150
• ⏰ Daily 17:00–23:00
• 🚘 Parking available (3 hours free)
• ✅ Naver/Catch Table reservations available, group bookings possible, corkage allowed (fee applies)

Lao Chongqing Hotpot's Dongtan branch is its global first location, opened in March 2025! They said they use traditional Chongqing seasoning culture along with carefully selected spices and broth to serve authentic Chongqing hotpot flavor, so I was super excited haha.

What the restaurant and seating are like

Inside Lao Chongqing Hotpot

When I walked in, the space was bigger than I expected, and the overall atmosphere was clean and comfortable. Definitely has that grand, flashy mainland Chinese feel haha.

There's a waiting area inside the restaurant so you can sit comfortably while you wait, but we had already reserved, so we were seated right away!

The tables weren't cramped, which made it nice for eating with a friend, and there were also semi-private room-like spaces that seemed good for family gatherings or larger groups. Most of all, instead of the usual chaotic, busy feeling that hotpot restaurants can have, the whole place felt neatly organized!!

Chongqing style or Chengdu style: choosing your mala hongtang

Lao Chongqing Hotpot Dongtan menu

What was fun about Lao Chongqing Hotpot was that you can even choose the style of mala hongtang! They explained that the Chengdu mala hongtang has a strong, numbing kick, while the Chongqing mala hongtang is cleaner and more crowd-pleasing. This time we ordered two: the Chongqing mala hongtang at beginner level, plus the tomato broth. You can choose up to two broths, and beyond that there are various other broths like mushroom broth, bone broth, and beef rib broth, so it's a good spot to bring someone who can't handle mala well too — everyone can pick to their taste.

You order comfortably through the tablet PC set up at your table, and there were quite a lot of other ingredients available too, so we happily loaded up haha.

What two people ordered and what it cost

• Sauce bar ₩3,000 x 2 people
• Chongqing mala hongtang (beginner) ₩14,000
• Tomato broth ₩13,000
• Pork collar 150g ₩12,900
• Mixed vegetables 450g ₩13,900
• Enoki mushrooms 150g ₩3,500
• Quail eggs ₩3,900
• Fried tofu roll ₩4,900

This is what we ordered and ate, and personally, for two people I think it'd be just right to add one more meat dish plus one more ingredient haha.

The 3,000 won sauce bar and the recipe to copy

Of course hotpot needs sauce haha. The sauce bar is ₩3,000 per person. There was a pretty wide variety of sauce ingredients, and personally I think it would've been even better with some diced onion added. Also, Lao Chongqing Hotpot's sauce bar has a recommended sauce recipe posted — the combination is so good it puts celebrity sauce recipes to shame, so you absolutely have to try making it haha.

Apron on, ready to eat!!

Our whole order filled the table~~

How spicy is beginner-level Chongqing hongtang?

The numbing, spicy flavor unique to mala hongtang, paired with the tangy, mild taste of the tomato broth. The Chongqing hongtang has three spice levels, and they told us the beginner level is roughly equivalent to Yeul Ramyun, so we ordered that — but personally it felt just a touch spicier than Shin Ramyun, so if you want it hotter, I'd recommend the intermediate level haha. And it really did taste like the real hongtang you'd get in China, which made me curious about the more numbing Chengdu hongtang.

The ingredients we ordered. The meat quality was really, really good, and the portion felt bigger than expected!!

And Lao Chongqing Hotpot's mixed vegetables are genuinely great — really generous, and they even include lotus root and shiitake mushrooms haha. The vegetables were all fresh, the portions were big, and I was just happy, happy.

The sesame oil dipping sauce discovery

The sauces we'd made earlier at the sauce bar. This time I made one following the celebrity-style sauce and one following Lao Chongqing Hotpot's recipe. Hotpot minus sauce equals zero.

Whoa, you absolutely have to follow Lao Chongqing Hotpot's recipe. Especially the sesame oil sauce!!! It's so good, I could cry. If you don't like spicy, skip the Thai chili and just pile sesame seeds on top instead — it's genuinely delicious that way too. Why am I only discovering sesame oil sauce now? From now on it's sesame oil sauce for hotpot, no question.

In goes the vegetables~ in goes the meat~

I love hotpot and I've tried plenty of places, but Lao Chongqing Hotpot has my genuine seal of approval. I saw a Naver review from someone who'd visited 9, 10 times in a single year, and now I get it haha. This is exactly the kind of flavor that could turn me into that person.

Why the tomato broth is a must-order

I especially love tomato broth (it's almost like comfort food to me), and Lao Chongqing Hotpot's tomato broth is a must-order. It's rich and really, really tasty!!

Also, if you add Lao Chongqing Hotpot's KakaoTalk channel, they give you a free cup of milk tea! Don't forget to claim that haha.

The fried tofu rolls are best if you dip them in briefly and pull them right back out~

Ah, so good. Just so good. So, so good. Looking at these photos makes me want to eat it all over again..! My husband and I couldn't even talk, we were so absorbed in eating hahahaha.

Would I go back? Chengdu style next time

This is genuinely the kind of flavor that melts your stress away. I might have to go back again next week, honestly. Skip the long waits and trips to far-off places — Lao Chongqing Hotpot seems like the move!!

Next time I want to try the Chengdu-style mala hongtang, and I'm also curious about other broths like the mushroom broth or beef rib broth, so I'll probably be back :) If you're looking for authentic Chinese-style hotpot in Dongtan, definitely check out Lao Chongqing Hotpot's Dongtan branch! A great Dongtan hotpot spot that even hotpot fanatics will find satisfying — Lao Chongqing Hotpot ♡