Little Sheep Mongolian Hot Pot

Wow. Just Wow. I was going to give this place 3 stars; I’ve been here at least a dozen times and even though its one of my favorite places to eat. the service is just terrible. Until tonight, that is.
Service was on it tonight, and I’ll be honest; I could probably never work here. It’s busy on any given night and has a good following during lunch time as well. For such a large place of business, they have no problem filling the house. Pleasantly blown away at how much better the service was tonight. Came for some AYCE, and noticed that they have opened it up to every night instead of just Tuesdays. Waters were never empty and my broth was filled without asking. Ordered a plate of beef, lamb, and pork belly, a large assortment of veggies, and misc side items that came in pairs of two. Perfect, I didn’t feel too bad about not liking/​eating the fish and shrimp balls.
Our waiter was even courteous and offered greetings and whatnot. Staff was almost running like a well oiled machine. Still a couple bumps in the road, got the yin & yang pot instead of the plain broth by accident. Usually I like the spicy so it wasn’t a big deal. although things have already started to rumble ;(
Also, what ever happened to the egg dumplings? I love them and recently they haven’t been available.
Boyfriend was so pleased at the money we saved doing AYCE & the surprise upgrade in service that they got an extra nice tip.

Really? How is it that people eat here?
I checked in with the host for dinner and he asked which option we wanted: all you can eat or a la cart menu? I asked him what the difference was because it was our first time there. He explained, «all you can eat is for all you can eat. A la cart is if you want to order off the menu.» Umm… duh. Am I speaking English… because last time I checked, I no longer had my «I’m from Hawaii» accent. So I asked him, «what do you recommend?» and he said, «it’s up to you.» Wow, thanks… so helpful. It was three of us ladies so we decided to just go with the a la cart menu.
We were seated, they brought water out to us promptly and left us to look at the menu. We picked out our order and flagged down a server since no one was checking up on us. We then waited until the order was brought to our table. When the partial order finally arrived, we started cooking our food. «Hmm…what’s taking so long, it’s not like they have to cook anything?» I said to myself. But it was my sister’s birthday celebration so I didn’t want to make a fuss out of it. As we started cooking, we were wondering if we were going to be brought dipping sauces so we asked. We were told we had to go to the back to get our own. Aww, shucks. I forgot to bring my mind reader cap with me to dinner. My bad.
The dipping sauces… what do I say about them? So if any of you have eaten at Sweet Home Café (my FAVE hot pot place), you know how spoiled we are with their (what is it up to now, about 20?) plethora of dipping sauces. So imagine that sauce bar… minus 15. Yup… and if you have to count soy sauce as 1 dipping sauce… no bueno.
Anyway, we flagged down servers to refill our waters about 3 times (we all drink a lot of water). The service was really bad and although the portions were great, I didn’t think the soup base (selection of two) was anything to die for and the quality of the food was also meh. The udon noodles actually looked like it had freezer burn on it.
When the bill came, I realized that we would’ve paid less if we selected the all you can eat option, even though we only ordered two meat plates (generous in portion), a few veggie plates and some other side dishes.
Needless to say, I won’t be returning anytime soon. Skip it and go straight to SHC.

Second time here. Food is good. Lunch special was plentiful. I wish I could have chosen glass noodles.
But, I had the exact same waiter. And, he was bad. The waiter we had needs to face us when talking. Be louder. Not mumble. Make eye contact. Explain better. Pay attention to us, not keep looking around. Stop fidgeting. Smile when greeting us. Or, at least not frown. It was as if he had no patience. First time I was here, I chalked it up to «maybe he’s having a bad day.» So I gave it another try.
People who brought out our food smiled and were nice and pleasant.
There are things I still want to try here, so I’ll be back. But, I might ask for another waiter if he approaches my table next time.
And, maybe next time, my review will be better.

I was at the same table as a friend who also wrote a review about the plastic. Warning: I probably won’t be as polite as her. It’s the next day, and I’m still upset. I will NEVER return to this place. In the first place, we were supposed to go to sweet home café. But since the line there was so long we decided to give this place a try. BIG MISTAKE. I might as well have thrown my money in the garbage. Three major key points as to why I’m so pissed. Number one, the food was abundant but the service was minimal to none. The waiters barely say anything and I had to flag them down and wave at them every time I needed help. Number two, we found plastic in our hot pot that had been there since they took it to us because it started MELTING in our hands as we fished it out. Flag down the first waiter and ask if any of the food was wrapped in plastic. OF COURSE we knew nothing had been wrapped in plastic because we placed each individual thing in there ourselves, but we were giving them a chance to explain themselves. First waiter looks at the plastic, looks at my friend who was holding it and then WALKS AWAY without saying anything! He goes into the kitchen so we think he’s going to ask the kitchen. 2 minutes later, he comes out and heads straight for the other side of the room and stays there. At this point, I can feel the beginnings of irritation start to bubble inside me but I squash them down so I can give them the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he got a manager, I think. WRONG. 15 minutes pass and we have to flag down the second waiter as he refills our cups. SAME THING. No response, walks away in a daze. Do they not train the waiters here?! At least acknowledge what I’m saying to you! After 15 minutes pass, I notice that ALL the waiters are avoiding our table. Full frontal irritation sets in, and finally a manager looking guy comes up to the table. This is where number 3 comes in. We were here for a birthday. We planned on spending money. We didn’t want a free meal, just a simple apology to paying customers who found some unknown plastic wrapper in their broth. Just own up to your mistake! My friend repeats the situation for the third time so the manager grabs the menu and SEARCHES through the entire menu until he settles on telling us it was the crab sticks. END OF THE LINE, I’M PISSED. The crab sticks WERE NOT covered in plastic. I would know because I put all 8 in there myself! Not to mention, the wrapper wasn’t nearly big enough to fit ONE crab stick much less 8! WHERE DID THEY FIND THESE CLOWNS THEY CALL EMPLOYEES??? It’s one thing to find plastic in my soup and another to LIE TO MY FACE! After spending an hour and a half in that place, the fastest service I got was them giving us the check. Imagine that. Then, I notice that because we had a party of 7, we had automatic gratuity. LOL! WHAT KIND OF JOKE SERVICE ARE WE PAYING FOR? I can get better service at ⁷⁄₁₁ for crying out loud! I look at all the waiters congregated around the cashier and sneaking looks at my group and I realize how much I could care less about causing a scene. No fucks given, I loudly yell, «Can I get some service in here? Finally!», give them my check, and leave that place permanently.
I’m sorry I strayed Sweet Home Café! Amazing hot pot that tastes just as yummy with excellent service and a free dessert is way better than that all you can eat crap place. DUECES LITTLE SHEEP. NEVER AGAIN.

Prior to the recent AYCE change to this restaurant, I have preferred hot pot places such as Ichiriki or Sweet Home Café. But after finally coming out of my comfort zone and eating an AYCE dinner here, I may have fully converted.
The restaurant starts to get busy after around 6:30 pm: dinner time. Luckily for my party, we came right before the dinner rush and therefore did not have to wait to be seated. The AYCE ordering system comes on a piece of paper with three columns, each column representing your first, second, and third round of orders. Of course you may order more than three rounds of food, you just have to ask the waiter for another paper. But three rounds of food is plenty and should suffice.
There is an array of foods Little Sheep has on their AYCE menu (too many to fully list). From dumplings, to meats, to noodles, to seafood, and vegetables, you’ll have gotten your nutritional food pyramid by the end of this meal. For your choice of meat, I recommend getting beef and lamb. They are both incredible. Although it is thinly sliced, the flavor is fresh and the meat, juicy. From its appearance, the color and texture of the meat justifies its freshness and flavor. Get the meat; you won’t regret it. After all, you are eating at Little Sheep!
Aside from the AYCE food choices, my favorite thing about Little Sheep is the broth. You may choose regular, spicy, or half-​half. Both soups are spectacular. The regular broth is rich and salty, and mimics the taste of oxtail soup. The spicy broth uses the regular broth as a base and red peppers. The soup itself is so rich and delicious, I’d be okay with just eating it by itself (but of course, we’re not at an AYCE to do so).
The service was average. They weren’t as attentive as I’d liked, but the food compensates. If you’re looking for a unique and delicious hot pot experience, I highly recommend coming during their AYCE times. You’ll definitely eat your money’s worth and leave feeling full and satisfied.

As I’m writing this review, I’m conflicted between giving this place 2 or 3 stars…
Date Visited: ½/​2016 (not our 1^st time)
Parking: Parking garage is attached to the building (stalls can be a tight squeeze and quite crowded!) so we park across the street at Ward’s other parking garage (attached to Nordstrom Rack).
Service: is WHY I’m tempted to give this place 2 stars. Each and every time we come here, the service sucks! We keep coming back to give the relatively new place more chances… after all, the restaurant is huge and every business has links to work out.
But after our last visit, I think the level of service has plateaued and this is the best it’s going to get. It took FOREVER to get our drinks, our food, and even extra napkins (we asked 4 people…). It wasn’t super packed and yet dinner dragged on because everything was… so…slow…
This happened to us before and on past occasions, we were presented $ 5 coupons as an apology, and even free watermelon drinks and food on the house. Since this place is a chain, I wonder if the other locations are just as slow?
Food & Pricing: food is good and pricing is okay. I’ve yet to try the AYCE option but when I split with my friends, we end up lying about $ 30 a person. I leave extremely full though, so I don’t mind.
Final Verdict: great for big groups, which is the ONLY time I would choose this place over other hot pot places. It gets really hot while cooking because of the hot pots and the lighting, so I usually bring my little pocket fan. Only come here if you have time to spare… we ended up ditching a movie we were planning on seeing because of the slow service here.

Hot pot is a favorite of mines and this place is pretty good! Their all you can eat deal is worth it if you like to pack your hot pot with a lot of meats and veggies! It’s $ 23.95 per person, but this deal is probably also the reason why it’s so busy! You need to make a reservation to save yourself and hour or more wait to eat!
I like getting the half and half soup base, but the spicy is HEAPING with chilies. It can get really spicy after a while, so I usually end up mixing the regular and spicy soup in my bowl while eating to keep it mellow.
Since it’s so busy in Little Sheep and the place is huge, the service isn’t as fast as you would like, but it’s hard to blame them with such a large restaurant and many people to tend to at once. So if you see someone walking by, be sure to tell them what else you want or risk not getting your meats and veggies when you want them!
Since most hot pot places are smaller and don’t take reservations, this is a great option if you have a larger group who wants to eat hot pot. I love the interactive cooking aspect, and you’ll definitely leave happy and full after a meal here!

Made reservations again and didn’t have a problem getting seated right away. However, the waiter asked me what I wanted to drink like 5 times before I was ready… (It wasn’t that I was slow to choose, he was just very persistent and rushing me). Also, service after we got our food was horrible. No one checked on us (to refill water, turn down the cooktop, or add more broth). We had to flag servers down to ask for a take out box and again to get our check. Our check took really long to come, even though we asked for it twice. We were there for an hour and a half total and were done eating after around 45 minutes. What’s the point of having those ear pieces in their ears if they don’t communicate/​provide quality service to customers throughout their whole dining experience (not just until they order food)?
I finally was able to try to sauces at the sauce bar (I kept forgetting the first couple times, plus the servers didn’t even direct us to where the sauces were located. The sauce labels were hard to read (I didn’t even see them at first). I feel like they should have a list of ingredients of the sauces or at least describe what they taste like. I understand things like shoyu and sesame oil but there were some others that I had no idea what they were. I don’t have any food allergies but this could be a problem for those that do have them.
We got to Little Sheep at 7:30 p.m. but a number of their items were already sold out, including one that was not crossed off on their menu but when we tried ordering it, they said they were sold out.
Also, the music is SO LOUD. I thought it was just loud in the waiting area but the whole restaurant was so noisy. It doesn’t have that the tables are kinda wide and you’re sitting quite far away from the person across of you. I felt like I was yelling to my friend across of the table and she couldn’t hear me numerous times. I get that they’re trying to be hip and play upbeat loud music, but still…
I’ll be back but only because they’re the only hot pot place with broth I actually like besides Ichiriki’s Angry Goma broth…

My 2^nd favorite hot pot place on the island. The 1^st is Sweet Home Café (I don’t think anyone will ever beat sweet home). I wish they had more variety of broth, they only have two. The spicy broth is basically the house broth but with chilies added. But the soup is decent with an adequate variety of side sauces to choose from.
The variety of ingredients is excellent, and everything is fresh and delicious. I love all the different types of dumplings and balls, and as a lamb lover I appreciate all the lamb choices. The breads here are superb, particularly the sesame bread. I dream about the spongy and flavorful sesame bread with the wonderful chewy crust. Great textures!
The price is decent for what you get, and the all you can eat sounds like an amazing deal that I need to take advantage of soon. My one gripe about little sheep is the service. Both times I went the other ingredients came out fairly quickly to our table but the rice took forever. I had to hound the servers about 3 times before the rice finally came. At that point we were more than halfway through the meal. Especially us Hawaii folks, we like rice with our meals :(. There seems to be a lot of workers but they are always rushing and don’t seem well coordinated. Our server rarely came to the table both times I went, and to get their attention you need to practically be jumping up and down screaming for them to look at you. On my 2^nd visit water was only refilled once, AFTER my party had already finished eating dinner. It was that hard to flag down a waiter.
Despite the less than stellar service the quality of food more than made up for it so I’d still recommend little sheep. Good for groups! But make sure you scrutinize your check, they had overcharged us on my last visit.

Buffet everyday for $ 23.95! It is the best deal because Little Sheep is beyond generous with their portion sizes.
Service can be slow when they are busy but they try their best and remain friendly.
Reservations are recommended.

Little Sheep is a hot pot chain with locations in US, Canada, China & Japan. This location is quite large as it’s the former E&O trading location.
I’ve been to several hot pot places in Honolulu, and this place has the largest variety of meats, including their different types of meatballs, IMHO.
I’ve been here a few times for the regular dinner menu. We went today for all you can eat dinner, which is available for $ 23.95, Mon through Thursday. They have an all you can eat order page that you check off items & give to the server. There’s no limit to the quantity per order, although I’ve read that others were limited by number of items per person. We ordered a bunch of meats (sliced pork belly, 2 types of beef), veggies (spinach, napa cabbage, enoki mushrooms), noodles & watermelon juice to drink. The meats are fresh & thinly sliced for quick cooking.
Watermelon juice, made at their bar, is really good & refreshing.
Service today, 12.9.15, was better than the past, where it is not the best, but if you’ve ever been to Beijing, you wouldn’t be surprised at all.

Enjoyed the sesame pancake. Also, the half/​half soup was a good choice, although we ended up taking all the chili peppers out of the soup to make it less spicy.
The atmosphere was modern and good noise volume, and the servers were very helpful.
It we cheaper than we expected considering the atmosphere and quality.

Visiting from Japan I really had no plans to have hotpot in Hawaii as there are all kinds of hotpots «nabe» in Tokyo. But my friends raved about it and we decided to have dinner here. First impression this the restaurant is so big and generously spacious… you can choose from table seats or booths (definitely as for a comfy booth). It was full house so we had a pitcher of beer at the counter bar area until a spot opened up.
The menu is great with everything pictured and all kinds of meats and huge selection of veggies. The big selection of help yourself dipping sauces was fantastic! I didn’t notice but definitely read the description above each of the sauces as it lets you know how to best mix them for specific items.
We went for half super spicy sauce with lots of herbs and half a mild white sauce. The meats are thinly sliced and sooo tender! I loved all the different sauces and added garlic to it… tasty!
This place is a definite must. The staff was friendly and our waiter was very polite.

If you want it, Baby, they’ve got it!
No, but serious. The selection here is great, and the freshness, and the cuts of meat, and and and well just trust me it’s good.
The pros:
Selection
Broth flavor (soooo good– my fave is spicy)
The ability to host larger groups (6 – 12 people? No prob!)
The servers (they are always ready to try to help!)
Lunch and other specials are good deals
Location (you can watch a movie then come here! Lol for the moment)
Reservations! (Don’t be silly. Just make em!)
Watermelon juice. Noms.
The cons:
Expense (I’ve found myself dropping quite a buy of dough.)
Time (I’ve seen very lengthy wait times for seating a withiut reservations. Also, I’ve waited too long to get food before. They’ve been cool about it, but I have gotten hangry once or twice!)
I really like the staff here, and how CLEAN and nice the restaurant is! The sauce bar is awesome, and I love love love the food. I will even try to have leftovers because they’re so good!
There are a few cons, but honestly, this is a nice place. Great for friends to meet up, great to bring a date, and a great place to bring your mom to meet up with your friends!
I recommend it. (And if you’re insane, try on a Tuesday night for all you can eat. But it’s a madhouse on Tuesdays… you’ve been warned.)
My favorite orders:
0. Watermelon carafe
1. Mongolian kimchee (just for eating)
2. Mongolian pancake (just for eating)
3. Spicy broth
4. Supreme beef and lamb shoulder
5. Napa cabbage
6. Sponge tofu
7. Seaweed knots
8. Watercress
Enjoy enjoy enjoy!

This hot pot restaurant gives me life-​so spicy!
Upon entering Little Sheep, I knew my experience here would be a good one. The restaurant itself is HUGE, clean, and cool (air temperature-​wise). For a hotpot place to be all these three things in Hawaii is what will keep me coming back. Along with decent prices, a sauce bar, and delicious drinks, who can go wrong?!
If you come to Little Sheep, give the Winter Melon Tea a try. Though a little on the pricier side of drinks, it’s worth it. Tastes exactly like the milk tea we all have come to love, just no dairy!
The broths are limited (two choices– original and/​or spicy), but delicious nonetheless. My family is a little less adventurous when it comes to eating the berries, spices, or spicy peppers in the soup, but it’s easy to put to the side on a plate, thanks to the many ladles that hang onto the side of the pot!
The only reason for the ⁴⁄₅ rating is because sometimes, the waiter would forget about us after out food was delivered for us to cook. We didn’t know how to turn down the hotplate, so by the end it became a chance for us to do yakiniku too, hah! They are generous with soups though. If you are running low on soup, they will refill it for you.
Will definitely be back, in need of more enoki mushrooms!

I haven’t been here in about a year. I came with 11 other Yeeps who wanted to try this place. They recently started AYCE Tuesdays for $ 23.95. It’s an excellent deal. The place was packed with a long wait time. We had reservations for when they opened so we didn’t have to wait that long.
I shared a table with Nadine C., Traci R. and Jennifer S. We’re the table that had the mild broth since none of us like spicy. They want you to cook and eat your food before you order some more. The first round of orders, you get 3 choices. After that, you get 2 choices. You have an hour and a half to order.
They had everything from beef, pork, chicken, vegetables, noodles and seafood. I wasn’t expecting seafood because of the price, but it was on the menu. I ordered a whole bunch of shrimp because that’s my favorite and it was fresh. I also got the calamari and cuttlefish balls. The beef and pork belly were also good. The one thing that wasn’t good was the corn on the cob. I took one bite and spat it out. I knew it was rotten. Yuck!
They also have a sauce table for your dipping needs. My favorite sauce was the sesame. The garlic sauce and sa cha sauce wasn’t bad either.

Recommended this place to my cousin who is here from San Diego. Had our family lunch there today, first time for most of them.
This was my third visit here so I had certain expectations, The first being the level of service. The past two times service was exceptional. The servers were attentive, friendly and helpful. Today, the service was just so-​so. Had to serve ourselves water A couple of times.
The food quality is still very good, most of us share the Sunday lunch special combo, which consisted of a variety of vegetables, fish, meat, shrimp, mushrooms, noodles and bean curd. The hot spicy soup base was very delicious. I selected black vinegar, green onions and cilantro as my first sauce from the sauce bar. Lunch combos easily fed two people per serving, making it a very affordable and filling meal.
The sauce bar can really enhance your dining experience; there are many sauces to choose from to dip your ingredients into once they have been cooked in the broth (shabu shabu-​style).
Not sure which sauces to use? There’s a handy sauce guide located atop the sauce bar, which provides you with suggested sauces for the different ingredients.
The prices are affordable, you can also select ala carte ingredients instead of lunch combo if you wish to try a variety of different things.
We all walked away very satisfied, and those who have never been here before today were delighted with the experience.

It’s been soooooo HOT and HUMID this summer. I mean, unbearably HOT HOT HOT. One would think about eating cold SOMEN noodles or cold soft tofu but why on earth would I venture here on yet another HOT and HUMID Tuesday? AYCE Dinner at Little Sheep Mongolian Hot Pot with a bunch of friends.
Yes, I’m a social eater. I don’t care to dine by myself. Since I started to Unilocal I’ve met many cool Yeeps. I usually tend to organize dinners and gatherings but when a fellow Yeep texted me asking if I wanted to partake in the second week of AYCE (all-​you-​can-​eat) at Little Sheep for $ 23.95 per person I jumped on board and that friend made reservations for us.
Little Sheep Mongolian Hot Pot is a chain of restaurants here in the USA and internationally. Several years ago I dined at their San Gabriel, CA with my SoCal Ohana and also was selected to last year’s Elite event here. To be frank I’m not a big fan of hot pot /​shabu shabu but do enjoy eating with friends. Reservations were set at their initial seating at 530pm. Upon arrival the restaurant was CHAOTIC at the hostess stand. CHAOTIC can pretty much sum up my dinner experience here. I’d say more than 75% of the diners that night were Chinese (including myself) and in our culture can be very rude by ignoring other diners who are standing in line.
Service this night was also CHAOTIC. We had several waiters (the ones with wireless earphones) that night and many, many wait staff. Our waiter asked which broth we wanted between regular and spicy. In our group we had a handful of newbies of Little Sheep so we opted for split broths. Each table had a plate of veggie starters (seasoned KONBU sea kelp and Mongolian kim chee cabbage) for us to munch on before the food arrived.
As part of the AYCE dining rules each person may order up to 3 items the first round and once consumed from round 2 you may each order 2 items here forth. Here is where the confusion was — — our table of 12 had 3 hot pots where each table ordered differently. Our waiters became confused with who ordered what. When the wait staff dropped off plates of food we were given wrong plates of food as well as given the wrong order sheets as our table was designated with a RED pen when selecting food items. There was a long turnaround time for us to get the plates of food we ordered.
For the whole evening we kept on having to flag down waiters and wait staff. The restaurant was PACKED. I mean FULL HOUSE with diners and with AYCE on its second week the restaurant staff need to resolve this issue.
Onto the food, it was not bad. I’m not a fan of boiled meats dipped in various sauces so I guess it was okay. But I was impressed with the large list of food items to choose from. My favorite of the night was beef tendon. Sooooo gelatinous.
We sat near the sauce bar and it was also CHAOTIC. There were many Chinese patrons who would ignore the line and went from the other side, hence taking a long time to custom make your dipping sauces. Regarding the flavors, they did have a large selection to choose from but I was disappointed I didn’t see any chopped Chinese parsley. Furthermore, the sauce station was messy as patrons would spill here and there, and I even witnessed this Chinese lady drop her whole dipping dish into the sesame sauce as while she was busy talking with her friends.
You have 90-​minutes to order food and that was ample time to order, cook and eat. It was so HOT and CHAOTIC the whole night. I was surprised when I found out it was cooler in the restroom than in the dining area! I also noticed several members of our table had beads of sweat on their faces. And when I came last year for the Elite event I was pleased the same manager was still working there. I was also impressed to see him work the tables as he walked back-​and-​forth which explained why his shirt was soaking wet. Great to see a manager help out when the restaurant is rocking.
Overall, a great dining experience when it comes to communal dining but personally there are issues the restaurant needs to resolve to alleviate the CHAOS we experienced during my meal here.
NOTES:
1) Literal Chinese translation of LSM is «LITTLE FAT SHEEP» — — I used to enjoy OXYMORONS when I was growing up.
2) Highly advisable for you to check your bill carefully. Our bills were divided by tables of 4 and for our check I noticed they AUTOMATICALLY added gratuity into the total.
3) Reservations highly recommended if you have a group of at least 6.
4) Don’t dress up to eat here as you’ll be walking out having your clothes smell like the restaurant. :P

All You Can Eat (AYCE) dinner on Tuesdays began at this location on 8−25−15. Twelve of us jumped on the band wagon and had a fun adventure… We had 3 tables with 4 people sharing one pot of broth per table, so 12 was a perfect number!
Our good friend messaged a bunch of us and we answered the call. Some of us were new to this restaurant and others had been here before. We divided ourselves in 2 main groups: Spicy and Plain eaters. My «plain» table of 4 gals had a big pot to cook our meat and veggies. One gal (the Duchess of Asuka Nabe) had been here before, so she was very helpful in ordering from the form on the clipboard. The form is good for up to 3 rounds of orders, but you can add more rounds if you like. The «spicy people» had divided pots with half spicy broth and half original broth.
For the first round, each person gets to order 3 menu items (example: quail eggs, shrimp balls, and udon noodles). On the 2^nd and 3^rd rounds, each person can order 2 menu items (example: pork belly, tofu, and pork dumplings). After ordering, we followed the experienced diners to the Sauce Bar — there were so many flavors to choose from — ponzu, House Sesame, Chili, Garlic, etc. Just fill a little bowl with whatever you want to try and come back for more! We appreciated the 4 slotted ladles and 4 tongs — one set for each person! The frequent refills of water and ice cubes were great! Yes — it’s the middle of summer in Hawaii and we’re consuming steaming, boiling Hot Pot! Go figure!
Service was a bit lacking, as we had to wave down the servers to order the next round and to check up on the missing food that we did order. We were a bit stressed because of the 90 minute cooking limit. Most of the food must be out of the pot and on your plate before ordering the next round. We were able to stay later (after the 90 minutes) and continue eating and chatting.
At first, they had some difficulty separating our bill. Eventually, they got it so that 3 of us could use our credit cards! Yay for Mileage Points!
It’s a really fun cooking and dining experience, but we wouldn’t be able to do it every week — our Food Babies would be REALLY showing! Some of us did the Stand Up exercise so our tummies could drop a little and let our lungs expand…
Breathe…breathe…
resist Food Coma and drive home…
Night night!
Zzzz…
p. s. When we return, remember to order the Watermelon Juice — it looked good, but we were really full!

Another hot pot restaurant to add to my list of hot pot spots. This is my first time dining at this restaurant. I’ve been to Nabeya Maido, Shabu Shabu house, Asuka Nabe, Ichiriki, Sweet home café, and Hot pot Heaven, the interior of the restaurant makes you feel like you are in a modern restaurant like Ichiriki. Sleek and dark furniture was appealing for me.
For our group of 6, we made reservations ahead so we didn’t have to wait like other parties. There were so many people coming in and out of the restaurant.
The menu is straight forward and breaks down how to order. But it was shame that there were no prices on the menu. Instead they have you write down how many per item you want to order on a separate sheet of paper, especially for the meat and vegetables, half or full plate you must indicate. The staff should change that and put the prices on the menu. It was confusing how much of group was going to order since many of us haven’t been here. It didn’t help that the staff were FOBs with heavy Chinese or Taiwanese accents and talked very fast that we couldn’t understand what most of them were saying. All we heard were meat and asking if we prefer meat over vegetables lol. We nodded that we got what our server was saying. This restaurant is a franchise and has locations in the West and East Coast as well as China, Canada, and Japan. This is the first location in Hawaii.
The dipping sauce station was alright. They didn’t have ponzu sauce available which was disappointing. After 5 mins waiting and standing there blankly, one of the workers brought over another container of ponzu. Most of the people were coming to get ponzu sauce, most popular sauce used at any hot pot restaurants.
I like that the meat was sliced thinly than some of the other hot pot restaurants. It is easier to eat while indulging with vegetables and rice. BTW, the rice is extra, cost $ 2.50 and meat cost $ 6 to 11 per order. Our group ordered two half and half broths, but it was a mistake. Our mouths were on fire from the spicy broth. That broth was soaked with hot red peppers. Later on as we were finishing up our dinner, I was fishing through the sea of hot peppers, removing and checking if there were any more meat or vegetables left. Good thing the scooping spoons had a holder to prevent the spoons from falling into the broth :)
I laughed at my bf as he was guessing what the final bill for all the meat, vegetables, beer and iced teas our group ordered. He thought it was $ 80, but he was so off. The final bill came out over $ 148 for party of 6. I’m so glad we didn’t order more food or the bill wouldn’t been higher. Happy that the server offered water several times during our entire dining time, not like the other Unilocalers who mentioned that they only got 1 refill of water once during their time.
I would try this place again, maybe during the lunch hour. I heard about their lunch special, so I am curious how good it is according to some foodie reviewers.

Après mes études j’ai mangé avec mes amies il était très délicieux!!! Je vous recommandez!!!