Shabu Shabu=Bland Bland

Last week I was trying to find a place to get take-out from and happened to stumble across the restaurant Shabu Shabu on Yelp.  The restaurant was categorized under both fondue and Japanese.  I like fondue.  I LOVE Japanese(even if I wasn't too sure of it on one of mine and Pat's early dates...I'm so glad back then I was trying to impress him and went with him to a Japanese restaurant even if I didn't think I would like it...but I digress).  So I love Japanese and I really like fondue, so what would there not to love about a Japanese fondue place?  And EVERYONE on Yelp loved it!  All I could find was raves about the place.  As a matter of fact the place sounded so awesome that Pat and I decided we should go there for dinner and forgo getting takeout.

So we walked into a very tiny restaurant in a strip mall.  It looked cool.  It had burners built into the table, just like a fondue place.  Pat and I each ordered a platter that came with two proteins, salad, and veggies.  The salads arrived first.  They were pretty good.  We really couldn't put our finger on what exactly the dressing was but it tasted pretty good.  During the salads the waitress, who was great, started our cooking pots.  We both went shabu shabu style, which was water with a piece of nori seaweed in it.  Shabu Shabu also includes three sauces:  a ponzu sauce, a peanut sauce, and a hot sauce(which was incredibly hot...although mixed with the peanut sauce pretty good). 

After our salads the waitress brought out our proteins.  Between Pat and myself we had scallops, shrimp, chicken, and pork.  The chicken and pork were sliced incredibly thin.  So thin I found myself wondering how they did it(I'm thinking they must have frozen the meat and then sliced on a deli slicer).  She also brought out two plates full of veggies, tofu, and soy noodles.

Then she showed us how to go about cooking our meal.  For the seafood you just drop it in and wait about 3 minutes, but for the chicken and pork you take a piece between your chopsticks, and while holding onto the meat you "swish swish" the meat for thirty seconds in the boiling water.  And so we did just this.  And after all that work the meal was ok.  The main problem was that the broth had zero flavor.  It was just bland.  One small piece of seaweed wasn't really able to flavor the broth well.  So thank goodness for the dipping sauces because without them I would have been thoroughly disappointed.  This way I was only somewhat disappointed.

 So the final verdict:  We will not be returning to Shaba Shaba and we don't really recommend it, unless of course you like bland food...in that case it would be a great restaurant for you.