Red 6…Hot Pot Heaven at $8.

In this day and age, a bargain is hard to come by. Sure, there is a lot of cheap stuff out there but to find something substantial, satisfying and reasonably priced, all at the same time, is a rarity.

When Becky mentioned great big, spicy hot pots at Red 6, I made sure to check it out promptly.

Red 6 is a tiny Mom & Pop shop in Parkcrest Plaza on Broadway in Burnaby. The room seats maybe twenty and on a cold, rainy day it’s packed. The main attraction here are the ridiculously huge, steaming hot pots.

This past Thursday was particularly wet and chilly. After Becky described the bountiful, spicy bowls on offer here, we grabbed The Gut and the three of us dug in.

The standard set for the Assorted Hot Pot consists of a choice of meat…beef, pork, chicken or fish.    You can also opt for the seafood version (shrimp, mussel and fish ball). You choose rice or noodle and one of seven types of soup.

The Gut went for the Miso Soup with chicken. It looked darn good and due to the long amount of silence, I’ll assume it tasted just as good.

Becky went with the Hot Kimchi Soup with chicken. Again, a big and tasty looking bowl and nary a complaint.

My choice was the Hot Curry Soup with Beef and noodles. This is one ginormous bowl. There has got to be 30 or 40 slices of very tender beef here. A generous portion of enoki, fried tofu, cabbage and scallions all swimming in a dense, velvety curry broth. A bit mild for my taste but still oozing with flavour. This bubbling cauldron seemed to never end. I simply cannot believe the amount of food you get here for eight bucks. Extraordinary. A very solid fill.

On top of the huge bowl, we grabbed a plate of dumplings.

Fairly average, these were. The wrap was a bit too chewy…the filling, a plain bit of ground pork. The dip helped immensely.

So amazed was I at the incredible value and sheer volume of tastiness, I dragged three more hungry folk for a Friday lunch.

Another part of the menu offers Hot Pot with Udon at $7. Carl’s Jr. went for the Hot Curry with Chicken. A solid choice by the looks of things. Still trying to get over the scope of these bowls.

Jackie Chan chose from the spicier side of the menu as usual. This is the Hot Chilli Soup with Beef.  We asked for them to make things as hot as they could. On the heat scale, this turned out to be right around medium.

Again, as if the hot pots weren’t enough, we grabbed a side dish. The Wontons in Chilli Sauce were several steps up from the pork dumplings. Not as killer as Spicy Court’s but a tasty version, nonetheless.

This time around I followed Jackie’s lead (and our server’s as well) and went for the Hot Chilli Soup with Pork.

At the start there is a nice amount of heat. Not too crazy but enough to keep from reaching for the Sriracha. The addition of cumin makes for a well-rounded broth. It just teems with tingling heat and loads of satisfying flavour. A big, solid bowl that I’ll be going back for again and again.