Thai suki
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Thai Suki, known simply as Suki (Template:Lang-th, pronounced [sū.kîː]) in Thailand, is a Thai variant of hot pot, a communal dish where diners dip meat, seafood, noodles, dumplings and vegetables into a pot of broth cooking at the table and dip it into a spicy "sukiyaki sauce" before eating. Despite the name, the dish only barely resembles Japanese sukiyaki, having more in common with shabu shabu and Chinese hot pot.
Thai sukiyaki evolved from Chinese hot pot served in restaurants catering to members of Thailand's sizeable ethnic Chinese clientele, in which an aluminum pot was heated on a charcoal fire at the table and the raw ingredients presented on one big plate.
In the 1960s a restaurant chain called Coca opened its first branch in Siam Square, Bangkok, offering a modified version of the Chinese hot pot under the Japanese name of Sukiyaki. (Although it only vaguely resembled Japanese sukiyaki, it was a catchy name for it because of a Japanese pop song called "Sukiyaki" which was a big worldwide hit at the time.) This modified Thai version proved to be a massive hit, and it wasn't long before other chains started opening "suki" restaurants across Bangkok and other cities, each with its own special dipping sauce as the selling point.
In Thai sukiyaki, diners have more options of ingredients to choose from, each portion being considerably smaller in order to enable diners to order many more varieties. The spicy dipping sauce (nam chim suki) caters to Thai tastes too, with a lot of chili sauce, chili, lime and coriander leaves added. The raw ingredients are presented on small plates and are cooked at the table in a gas- or electrically-heated stainless steel pot containing broth. Usually, an egg is added to the broth at the start of the meal.
Today the MK Restaurant chain is the most popular in Thailand with around 200 restaurants across the country and 23 in Japan. Coca is making a rapid spread abroad too, already serving Thai suki in 24 outlets across Asia and Australia and further outlets planned in the US and Europe. Coca's strategy abroad is focusing on high-income customers. Other popular chains include Texas and Lailai.
Thai sukiyaki also spread to Malaysia, such as Smoke BBQ Company serving Malaysian Thai sukiyaki.