‘Saliva oil’: China eatery recycles leftovers, blends with new ingredients for resale
Fresh diners served up a blended mixture of new and previous customers’ oil from spicy hotpot dishes, eatery now under investigation
A Sichuan hotpot restaurant has been punished by the local government for creating “saliva oil” by recycling the leftover chilli oil soups of diners and mixing the brew with new oil to serve the next customers.
The Nanchong Market Regulation Administration, in southwestern China’s Sichuan province, reported on December 2 that it busted a hotpot restaurant that recycled leftover “old oil” and added it into its hotpot soup base.
The government conducted an investigation on the restaurant after receiving a tip-off from a diner.
They seized 11.54 kilos of recycled beef tallow, a chief ingredient of Sichuan and Chongqing spicy hotpot, in the restaurant’s kitchen.
They also examined four pots of ready-made soups that contained beef tallow that looked different from packaged beef tallow they bought from legitimate companies.
The restaurant’s owner, surnamed Chen, admitted that they had been extracting chilli oil from diners’ leftover soup base since September, and mixing it up with new oil, to “improve the soup’s flavour” and “mend its dismal business”.
