Its sauce consists of dried shrimp, peanuts, garlic, hot pepper, tea leaves, and salt. The sauce is also used in cooking other dishes and is mildly hot. Soy sauce and fresh raw egg are usually added to it to make a dip. This style of hot pot makes use of almost all of the ingredients mentioned above. Both chrysanthemum and mutton hot pots are Peking style.
Chrysanthemum flowers are harbingers of coldness.
Back in the old days when chrysanthemums bloom, it was considered the time to start eating hot pot. The principle ingredients are shrimp, thin slices of pork kidney and liver, and fish fillet. These take little time to boil, so alcohol was once used as the fuel for its low heat intensity. When the alcohol burns under the pot, the flames flare out in the shape of a chrysanthemum blossom, and mum leaves are actually scattered into the pot to add a touch of the flavor of the plant. Mutton hot pot is a legacy of the northern nomads.