Shabu & Shabu

My mom and I found this place couple years back while looking for a hot pot restaurant. Ever since then, we have been coming here for a casual mother-​daughter date. The food here is delicious and they give you a lot of ingredients for your order. I also love the set up of the booth; it really makes the experience private and enjoyable with the group you’re with. Compared to the other hot pot restaurants, this place has by far the best broth, largest amount and more variety of ingredients served, and the best sauce. If you’re looking for Korean style hot pot, this is definitely the place to go.

Food taste OK but I must say service sucks! Never once checked us and ask if everything was OK
. And the restaurant was empty. We were the only customer.

I was given a gift card to Shabu & Shabu, so I decided to try this place out with my mom and sister. The interior is nicely decorated with a trendy modern finish. They have booth/​room along the walls that is roomy enough to seat four. There are also tables along the middle of the restaurant. Each of the booths have a button on the wall to alert your server when service is needed. The table has four circular cut-​outs where your burner is located. When they bring out your hot pot filled with broth, you just close the lid until it comes to a boil. If you take a peak under the table, the burner has a knob to allow you to adjust the temperature setting. (If I remember correctly, you turn the knob to the right to turn up the heat) There are several shabu options on the menu to fit your needs (vegetarian and non-​vegetarian). I recommend the combination which allows you to choose 2 options such as the premium beef & seafood. You can also request sides at an additional cost. The non-​vegetarian options all come with an order of vegetables including napa cabbage, fish cake, rice cake, 1 broccoli, 1 slice of tofu, 1 hotdog, leafy greens, kabocha squash, ¹⁄₃ of a corn, enoki mushrooms, 1 raw egg wrapped in aluminum foil, bok choy, and mung bean sprouts. As you can see, shabu & shabu is a great healthy options for those of you looking to eat out while watching your figure. They also offer different spice levels for their dipping sauce which is generally brought over to you but there is a sauce bar where you can attempt to make your own concoction (from what I hear). I ordered their very spicy dipping sauce. Although I didn’t find it spicy, their special mix taste pretty yummy. Their broth is mediocre compared to another place I’ve had in the past.
Tips:
–Read your cheat sheet on the table with recommended cooking times.
–Leave your udon noodles until the end.
–Egg wrapped in aluminum foil is raw. You can boil it or crack it in your broth. If you crack it, leave this towards the end of your meal.
So what did I think of my experience?
Interior: ⁵⁄₅
Food Quality: ⁵⁄₅
Taste: ⁴⁄₅
Price: ⁴⁄₅
Cleanliness: ⁵⁄₅
Service: ⁰⁄₅ (yes… zero)
I would generally give this place a four-​star rating because the quality of their meat and vegetables. However, I had to knock off a star due to their poor service. Trust me. it was soo bad… I almost gave them a 2-​star rating in the heat of the moment. (Never make decisions when pissed off… haha) So… how did the service suck? Lets see… I was there for ~ 1 hour from sit-​down to finish. During the entire time frame, my server was no where to be found. Um… hello~~~ There is a call button! Yes… Except mine had a «broken» sign on it… You would think that if they place you in a room with a broken call button, they would at least have the courtesy to stop by once in a while to see if you need anything. Nada… After waiting around for 20 minutes for someone to come by to offer my check, I had to run to the front and track someone down instead. I even stacked up their plates nicely so its easy for them to carry back to the kitchen. Why? IDK… boredom from waiting. O. o
I politely told them what I thought of their service and why and their resposne was pretty much, «we were busy». I wanted to leave them ZERO TIP… However, I had a gift card and the remaining balance would go to waste (b/​c I don’t plan on coming back). So my server got an ~18% tip off of doing absolutely nothing.
I’ve read reviews where some people received excellent service. Maybe I got unlucky and just came on the wrong day. It wasn’t busy for the first half hour I was there? Oh well.

So I tried Shabu Shabu for the first time in Dallas and I’m guessing it spoiled me. When I came back to GA I really wanted to find a good place here. I went to Shabu & Shabu because it was the highest rated of the hot pot places in the area.
The setting is really welcoming, modern and fun. They have separate booths with coverings for privacy and a button you can push to call for the waiter at the table.
I got the premium beef and my husband got the chicken and beef. The provide you a small hot pot in the table to use. My husband’s didn’t work very well and his barely came to a boil while mine was bubbling like crazy. The provide you a plate of various vegg: mostly leafy greens, ONE piece of broccoli, half a mushroom, an egg, tofu, rice cake piece, and… for some strange reason, a piece of hot dog… there were also some rice noodles.
They only provide one kind of sauce, which they make mild to hot depending on preference. The sauce was ok, but prefer some options. Other shabu shabu places make a soup out of your leftovers, but no one did here.
Neat experience to try something new, but left a lot to be desired.

Loved the spacious booth setup, with curtain and a bell to ring each time we needed the server. The tables have individual hot pots for each person, which is always the best so you don’t mix up food or compete with different flavors. I ordered one of the combo meat & seafood options… easiest to order (instead or ordering a la carte). As with other hotspot places, side portions of veggies are provided in plentiful amounts.
I went to make my own sauce at the sauce bar, which the server said was ok despite a sign stating otherwise. I would have been perfectly happy if the ingredients were brought to my table for me to make it. The server also made us a couple of spicy and «very spicy» (though I don’t think it was that spicy… it didn’t have the special Korean sauce) sauces… they were just ok. I liked my sauce better.
Once the broth heats up, I immediately drop the oyster mushrooms in, for flavor, and the larger items and ones that take longer to cook. Don’t be the fool that drops in the watercress, cellophane noodles and the meat all at once… the meat will toughen up and the rest will disintegrate… use your chopsticks to swish meat back and forth a bit and it should cook quickly. Use the little basket gizmo they give you for the noodles and watercress.
Came here after a failed attempt at Mini Hot Pot down the street– they had a very long wait and was busting at the seams with people… I felt very zen walking into the much quieter Shabu & Shabu. As with all hot pot places, I offer these tips: Don’t wear your favorite shirt… you may end up splashing broth or sauce all over the front of it. And wear layers! It gets very warm when your face is peering over a hot pot of broth for a long period of time.

I came here with my sister while out hunting for food on one lazy Sunday. The shop is nicely decorated; it was really modern and stylish. I was happy the booths are private. We ordered the premium beef and a bit of everything, and oh boy, it WAS premium. The beef was juicy and sweet, well worth the price. Other food items were waste of money. Service was terrible. We asked for rice twice but it never come. When I stood up and approach the waiter about rice, he said, «what rice?» They never re-​filled my water as well. It was an unsatisfying meal. I cried for my wallet, and I will never go back there again.

The food was the same as any other Korean style shabu around so nothing really stood out. The reason for not giving it a higher rating was the service. They hardly came back to our table to see if we needed anything else. We had to flag them down three times. Probably won’t go back.

Let me start off by saying that I normally rate «heavy» on the stars. But not for this place. We were traveling through atl and stopped here for dinner. I called about 7:30 to confirm their hours and was advised that they are open until 10:30. We didn’t get there until 9:42. I know the exact time because the waiter let me know that I only have 8 minutes to order. After that, we were SOL. after rushing to order and then getting the food. We were rushed to eat and then rushed to pay. If you are so dead set on leaving at 10:30, when I call just let me know the kitchen hours are different!
Bonus– saw a cockroach climbing up the wall. I’m living in Florida now and they don’t bother me too much, but to see one on GA was a bit more a shock.
Won’t return.

Great shabu place. My dry cleaner next door recommended for me to try this place so I did. Note: Its not chinese but korean. The interior is very pretty, bright, and clean. Its very private with your own booths. It is mini hot pot style so you get your own little broth bowl. They have a small sauce bar that is limited to traditional options (green onion, soy sauce, garlic, etc.) Still good for me! I recommend getting the seafood/​meat combo ($ 20?). The quality of the premium meat is REALLY GOOD. I think that is what puts this place apart from mini hot pot down the street. The seafood has a pretty good selection also of octopus (but no knife!) blue crab, squid, mussels, shrimp, etc. The veggie selection is not as much as mini hot pot but pretty good options. They give you some items that are different from the typical selection like rice cake and pumpkin/​squash?. Customer service/​waiter is great especially since we can also push the red button (it came in handy when i needed help right away because I burned myself (im clumsy).
Overall, great place for shabu shabu.

A cute little place for hot pot style dining. For the combo options, you can choose the regular beef and premium beef as choices. So basically, you can choose beef and beef. Lol. Really. My friends did precisely this. As for me, I went with something more simple: a single premium beef serving.
The service was friendly and cordial. The staff came by periodically and checked on us, but then again, the restaurant wasn’t large enough to neglect guests.
Parking spaces were available within this mini shopping area. If you aim for Marcus’ Pizza (?), Shabu & Shabu will be within the same complex. It’s diagonally across from RaceTrac too if that helps.

I like it the staff was help being our first time and showed us how to do the things and how they do it. Fun times

One of the better places to get hop pot in the area. The broth could use some seasoning for sure as it’s plain. They give you choices for sauces which you can get very spicy. I got the combination seafood and beef which was plenty of food. Came hungry left stuffed!

YESS!!! This is my favorite hot pot place in Atlanta because their ingredients are very fresh! At some hot pot restaurants in town, seafood is almost slimy because it isn’t so fresh. However, seafood at Shabu & Shabu wasn’t slimy at all and I could even smell how fresh it is! Also, their service is totally amazing! If you need anything, just ask! They will try their best to accommodate your needs! Also, don’t be fooled by their sign stating sauce would be only prepared by servers. Just like mini hot pot places, you can make your own sauce or you can ask them to make it for you.
Also, this place is very clean and it is not steamy! At some of alternative restaurants definitely get too steamy and I feel like suffocating.(Almost it makes me feel like sitting in a sauna!)
My only complaint is their limited selection of sauces. I wish they get more varieties! OMG! There is one bottle named «very hot sauce» This is NOT Korean Cho-​Go-​Chu-​Jang! It is really really spicy! Don’t make the mistake that I made before!!!

I love hot pot, I just had it the last two days at my house for example. While this place will never beat the amazing hot pot that my mom makes, It is quite delicious! I think it’s the sauce and the soup that they have. I am definitely a fan!
I recommend the Seafood and premium beef combination!

I come here every week… which says a lot. Its so damn good. I love their sauce that they make… no you don’t make it yourself, but am pretty sure you can ask. (I’ve seen people who are bold enough to do it themselves) But overall… its good to a perfection based on your spiciness level. Their broth is amazinnng. It is just right. Service is mediocre… but hey c’mon. Its a Korean restaurant so don’t expect much customer service. if you want their service thats what the bell is for. Overall, they are friendly about it. I would definitely recommend this place to new people looking for a Shabu Shabu place.

I used to hate Shabu shabu as in general. You dump stuff into boiling water to get the food. This is Korean style not a Cantonese or Chinese style, so icomparing this place to mini hot pot wouldn’t be fair.
I usually go on lunch hour, it’s about dollar or two cheaper.
Get premium beef, which is thin sliced rib eyes.
I like how they get you to choose the spiciness of the sauce as well.

Trickery! Shabu Shabu is what a Japanese dish but this is a Korean restaurant. In the words of Icona Pop, I don’t care, I love it.
This place is purrrfect for the eat at your own pace kind of place. I always feel rushed whenever I’m at a restaurant where food is served to you in heaps. At Shabu Shabu, you cook your own food as you eat so it is always fresh and hot. I ordered some combo that came with a bunch of meat and veggies. The meat was sliced TIN FOIL thin (thinner than paper thin) so that you will only need to drop it in the boiling pot for several seconds before dipping in your personal sauce. I also find it really convenient having your own personal hot pot because that eliminates the headache of figuring out whose fish ball is whose.
I spent a good two hours chatting away while dropping raw meat & veggies into the hot pot. The convenient button on the wall alerted a waiter if you have need of anything whether it may be to refill your broth, ask for more dipping sauce, or even their company. The only complaint I may have is that I was not given the option to customize my own sauce. I did not mind because I found the sauce to my liking but you can ask a waiter to bring additional proponents of the sauce with just a push of a button. Splendid.
Eat at your own pace
Not jap, but Koreanese
Fresh food and plenty

Shabu & Shabu is a weird name. In Japanese, Shabu Shabu is the sound you make when you stir the ingredients in the broth. It’s fun to say, «shabu shabu shabu» as you stir your beef in the broth. But this place’s name is Shabu & Shabu. Why is that ampersand there? Maybe when the ingredients are stirring in the hotpot, the Korean hotpots make a, «shabu and shabu and shabu» sound.
Anyway, this is a Korean hotpot place. One thing I noticed was that everything looked clean and steril. They had bright, clean white walls and tables. It looked so clean and steril, I felt like I was eating inside of a hospital.
You get your own little pot of boiling broth to cook your stuff in. This place is Korean so it’s different from the Chinese hot pot places. For example, they don’t have certain Chinese items that I love such as fish balls, taro, and others.
They make their own sauce for you, which can be good or bad. I like to make my own sauce. But they give you a choice on the level of spiciness: mild, hot, medium hot, and extremely hot. I got the medium hot. They mixed chopped garlic, jalapenos, sriracha, chili oil, green onions, ponzu sauce, soy sauce, peanut sauce, and a dash of ketchup. The ketchup was a nice touch.
So you order your main items and you can order extra side items. I got the seafood combo. It came with squid, piece of crab, baby octopus, mussels, clam, and shrimp. I was hoping for some fish slices, but oh well. All items comes with a huge plate of veggies and other goodies. I saw watercress, bok choy, cabbage, bean sprouts, fish cake, egg, hotdog, clear noodles, enoki mushrooms, corn, and possible other stuff.
In the side items section, you can get a ton of variety of stuff. They have dduk (Korean rice cakes) and dumplings as a side item, but they do not offer those anymore because they dissolve in the broth. So don’t order them.
Besides the main items and the side items, you can also get entrees. These include various noodles such as udon noodles or ramen noodles that you can put into your broth near the end. I think that’s pretty cool. I actually got the udon noodles and cooked it in the broth at the end. I liked it, especially since the broth absorbed all the flavors from all the stuff you cooked.
The broth is subtle. It tasted refreshing and Korean. It’s different from the Chinese hotpot places where the taste is more Chinese. I can’t describe it exactly, but the broth had a very Korean taste. It is on the bland side. So I put some of my sauce in it to spice things up.
My seafood combo seemed fine. I just had trouble eating the crab. It had no meat on it. I have no clue why they even bother to give me that. Maybe to flavor the broth? They should’ve just given fish slices or more fish cakes.
On Google Maps, it looks like this place is located on the same side as H-​Mart. It is not. It’s on the opposite side. In fact, you have to get on N. Berkeley Lake Rd to get into the shopping center.
I liked this place, but I can’t help to feel I was missing something. Maybe I missed my taro and fish balls. Maybe I needed stronger flavor in the broth. Maybe I wanted to make my own sauce. I’m not sure. But if you want to get hotpot Korean style, this place is good for you. I give it 3.75 stars.

When friends suggest hot pot, I’m usually a bit weary; only because I suck at making my seasoning for the broth cause no matter how hard I try, it just doesn’t taste like my grandma’s!
But when fellow Unilocaler Hoa suggested Shabu Shabu for dinner I said sure, why not? I had always passed by and always wanted to try them out.
We entered and found the restaurant extremely clean. Like, really, really clean. Major plus on that! It was pretty cool that each «booth» was semi-​private with a little drape that you can let down so you can be in your own area.
I decided on the combo beef with seafood and asked that they make the seasoning for me.
We also ordered the beef with rice paper.
The combos come with an assortment of napa cabbage, enoki mushrooms, glass noodles, an egg, ½ a hotdog as well as a mushroom cap. Unfortunately, they do not have the usual assortment of veggies for free including: watercress which I prefer. You can definitely order a side of it though.
The sauce they made was a little lacking for me, although it offered me a great starting point. That’s fine, cause their sauce station is very adequately stocked, with everything labeled. A little more than halfway through our meal, they gave us some Korean style noodles on the house. That was a nice touch, although the noodles needed a lot longer time to cook as they were very tough and thick.
The meat was really good. It was red, not brown like it had been hanging out in the fridge or on worse yet– a counter! The seafood platter comes with ½ a blue crab, 1 clam, 2 mussles, some calamari rings, a baby/​small octopus and 2 shrimps.
The service was pretty prompt, however, we did have to ask a few times for napkins. The great thing is, as is with most Korean restaurants, there is a little buzzer you can press for service.

Shabu & Shabu is 5 stars for me because it’s quickly become my favorite place for Asian hot pot in metro Atlanta. The food is high quality and the service is exceptional. According to Chloe M’s review, Shabu & Shabu opened Memorial Day Weekend 2012 (end of May), yet they still have their «Grand Opening» banner displayed outside, nearly 3 months later.
The restaurant is located in a small strip mall at the corner of Pleasant Hill Rd. and North Berkeley Lake Rd. While the address for the restaurant places it on Pleasant Hill, you actually turn into the shopping plaza from North Berkeley Lake Rd, very close to the intersection. If traveling northwest on Pleasant Hill, it’s just before the Walmart.
Shabu & Shabu is the newest and nicest of the mini hot pot restaurants. Compared to places like Mini Hot Pot and Gom Shabu Shabu, Shabu & Shabu is the cleanest and shiniest. The interior is swanky — bright white walls and tabletops, stone tile floors, Korean-​style private booths with billowy curtains, oversized booths out in the open, and big communal tables in the center. All furniture is modern and contemporary. Casual atmosphere.
If you’ve never eaten at an Asian-​style hot pot place before, the concept is pretty simple (and fun). Each person gets their own mini hot pot to cook their food in. The hot pot is filled with broth and then you order the ingredients you want to cook in it. Additionally, there is a sauce and seasonings bar where you (or one of the staff members) can create your own sauces, used mainly as a dipping sauce for your meats and vegetables. Oftentimes, the key to having a good hot pot experience is in the sauces you create/​use.
How Shabu & Shabu works is: you pick out your meats and/​or seafood and it comes with a large plateful of vegetables and other food. Examples of the meat and seafood include beef, chicken, pork, tripe, fish, shrimp, squid, octopus, lobster tail, etc. One order of meat, which is usually enough for one person, is about $ 13 – 14 per plate, unless you get the lobster tail, which is $ 30. You can order additional meats and veggies as «sides» for less cost. You also have the option of noodles (udon and ramen) and can have your leftover broth made into Korean porridge (for the seriously hungry).
All of these hot pot places have two kinds of beef on their menu: regular beef and «premium» beef, which is a better cut. Definitely shell out the extra dollar to get the premium beef. It’s worth it.
My personal recommendations are the premium beef ($ 13.99) and the baby octopus (side order: $ 4.99). Generally speaking, the quality of the ingredients here is very good, so I think it’s hard to go wrong with any of them. The meats and seafood are simply fresh and savory. They don’t skimp on quality here.
The plate of veggies and sides (that comes with each meat/​seafood entrée order) includes enoki and shiitake mushrooms, fish cake, rice cake, tofu, cabbage, bok choy, broccoli, corn, sausage, pumpkin, egg, sausage (like a hot dog — delicious), and noodles. It’s a lot of food and I like it because it includes a lot of healthy veggies. Win.
Most people like to hard boil their eggs, but you can also crack it and make egg drop soup. If you decide to crack your egg, I suggest doing it at the end so you don’t coat all of your ingredients in egg.
The temperature of the hot pots can be controlled by turning the small knob on the gas stoves underneath the table.
As mentioned previously, making a good dipping sauce is essential. If you’re not sure what to do, ask a server and they can customize a sauce to your liking. The sauce and seasonings bar includes all the Asian sauces such as soy sauce, peanut sauce, ponzu sauce, soybean paste sauce, Sriracha, etc. along with spices and veggies such as minced raw garlic, chopped jalapeño, cilantro, scallion, Thai chili peppers, etc. My mouth is watering just writing about it.
Service is excellent. Shout-​out to Andrew. He takes fantastic care of the customers, going «above and beyond» to make their experiences a great one. As is typical of Korean restaurants, each table at Shabu & Shabu has a small button you can press whenever you need service. It’s very convenient.
Finally, Shabu & Shabu gets bonus points for playing the latest K-​pop (Korean pop) music including Gangnam Style (!).