Shabro Hot Pot Shabu Shabu & Korean cuisine — Restaurant in Carrollton

Worst service I’ve experienced in my ten years living in DFW.

The waitress never checked in on us, never refilled our drinks, and never took away a single plate.

She completely forgot about the table next to us, so we watched four people get up and walk out without eating, after 30 minutes of waiting in vain for the waitress to come and take their order. How embarrassing!

And when we did speak with the waitress, she didn’t seem “all there”. I honestly believe she was high on drugs or maybe experiencing a medical episode, because her behavior was not normal.

The bus boy, the only other employee we saw, was either sitting in a chair or leaning against a wall for the whole hour we were inside, and he never took away a single plate, even as our table became covered with dirty, empty dishes from the buffet.

In addition to the terrible service, we also observed two possible health code violations:

The waitress was wearing open-toe pajama slippers, which I am certain is a health code violation.

Meanwhile, the ice cream bar consists of two 5-gallon buckets of ice cream that customers are invited to scoop themselves — and if that isn’t a health code violation, it should be. I don’t want to eat ice cream that other customers stuck their dirty hands in, gross!

Finally there were two more glaring problems that convinced us management truly doesn’t care:

First, the whole restaurant groans constantly with a loud, humming noise from the speakers. Apparently no one cares enough to fix it, and also no one cares enough to shut the speakers off.

Second, Shabro uses the wrong peanut sauce. Instead of the normal peanut-sesame dipping sauce you find at hot pot restaurants, Shabro uses the thick peanut-sugar sauce typically served as a condiment for meat at Thai restaurants. Although this might seem like a minor detail, it actually says a lot: it tells us that Shabro management doesn’t know what they’re doing. Or alternatively, they do know, but they don’t care, so they buy the wrong sauce anyway.

At $29, I regard my dinner at Shabro as a complete ripoff. I will not be coming back, and, considering there were only three other tables filled at 6 PM on a Saturday, apparently no one else is coming...

I'm looking at the reviews and I'm wondering why there's my review is so low compared to everyone. When I went, we were a group of 4. I first walked in I felt, wow this place is huge, not bad looking, a little empty but it's okay (more food for us). We walk up stairs & was greeted very nicely by the waitress, she asked us for the broth of our choice (as they have a few) and told us that we can go pick our vegetables. I was very impressed with the selection of vegetables and sauce is that they had, but when I had came back to the table I noticed that all of the broths looked the same, (we ordered 3 different ones and a spicy one) and basically tasted like something super watery and was a light tan tint of water. (And i'm not trying to be picky, I've been to many hotpot places and none which had broth that looked like this, there was no spices, no colour, no herbs, just a tinted water.)

We're all very confused on why our soups look like this & maybe it was our fault for not asking but it was our first time so we thought this was how it was. Maybe their broth is super healthy? We decided to eat anyways although being disappointed & confused. Half way through our meal one of my friends pot has not come to a boil at all, we asked for help, got help but almost near the end of our meal his pot was not boiled. He told the lady he just didn't want to eat anymore (as even she was very aware his pot had not boiled the entire supper). When 3 of the 4 of us were done, his pot began to boil. He was very unhappy but he was also so hungry.

At the end of night it was time to pay. I am aware with a big group (usually 6+) they will charge tip with our bill. We were only 4 and we didn't even say if we were paying together or separate. They just gave us one bill. Has this happened to anyone?

Overall, my friends and I were very disappointed in our first experience here. The reason for my 2 stars is because of the selection of veg & sauce and broths. But my entire experience along with my friends was just... very unsatisfying. I would love to know if anyone knows what I...

TLDR: First wave of meat was great. Rest was extremely poor. Choices of sauces great. 15% automatic gratuity (for 2) and then asked for tip on the credit card receipt (check your receipts people!). Ended up more expensive than Manna Hot Pot across the street with poorer quality meat. Broth was great, spicier and more rich; however, I would head elsewhere if you're going for the proteins.

I'm a regular at the Manna Hot Pot across the street. That was my first hot pot experience and currently holds the standard from these 2 locations. With that said, this restaurant is on the second floor. The atmosphere was great on a Saturday night, quiet, not too busy and clean. We got our broth pretty quick. The spicy broth here outperforms Manna. They also have potatoes/sweet potatoes if you're a fan and an excellent choice of house/chili sauces as well. Those were the pros. Now the cons...

The first wave of meat dishes were excellent. Rib eye was great and pork belly was fantastic. The boneless short rib had cartilage in it, so we stopped ordering it after the first round. The second wave was extremely disappointing. The pork belly was 80% fat, and the rib eye was an off-brown color. I'm not exaggerating here, it was flat out brown with a tinge of redness and smaller than my fist. The first was of rib eye was large, vibrantly red, and healthy in appearance. They also added a 15% gratuity and then had the audacity to ask for tip on the credit card receipt that didn't list the 15% gratuity that was listed on the itemized.

Thinking back, I'm guessing this is why the place wasn't absolutely packed on a Saturday night like Manna Hot Pot usually is. You know what they say; packed is a good sign of great business, both quality in food...