Hi foodventurers! Who does not fancy hot boiling shabu-shabu? 😉 I recently visited one shabu-shabu house in Gajah Mada, and it’s called Dolar Shop!

Okay, first question to answer is that why “Dolar”? It should be “Dollar” right? Did I make a typo mistake? Rest-assured, I did not! To be honest, I don’t exactly know as well despite the owner’s kind effort in explaining to us. But to explain why it was named “Dolar Shop” (which makes it  more like a money changer instead of restaurant), I will try.

If I perceived it correctly, the main reason is in language pronunciation, as it came from China, they actually meant “Dou Lao” which means fishing and to earn a lot of money! So, they tried to find an english word which sounds like it, which is “Dolar” (the definition is not far away as well). The main concept of this restaurant is to offer the patrons a good hot pot experience. Afterall, this style of cooking and eating is pretty popular in China, especially when winter is due. While the traditional hot pot or shabu-shabu is mainly executed in a big pot, Dolar Shop prefers to improvise and serves in an individual pot. The main mission is to have the guests enjoy different flavours in each pot. Guests can also enjoy “fishing” the desired food in a more intimate way. It will also be more hygine.

To why they decided to name it “Dolar” instead of “Dollar” remains a mystery to me.

Did you know that Dolar Shop is originated from Macao? Dolar Shop is afterall, a franchise and the Dolar Shop here is the first outlet outside the land of China.

In Dolar Shop, there are plenty of food to be chosen and most are home-made. You can find hand-made beef meatballs, fish meatballs, squid meatballs, prawn meatballs and even hand-made noodles. There are also good quality Australian beef, lamb, seafood, oyster mushroom, assorted vegetables, and more others. For the soups, there are 9 types of soup to choose from. Oh, did I tell you that there is a bar where you can pick so many sauces to accompany your food?

Interior-wise, Dolar Shop tries to focus more on bring out the modern and elegant dining hall. The dining hall is spacious, equipped with comfortable sofas and big windows to make sure that the hall receives a decent amount of natural day light.

Serving so many choices of food with price ranging from IDR 24k – IDR 100k, they have some set menu with price ranging from IDR 135k – IDR 175k to choose from.
We got to enjoy Set Lunch C and it was a good value for money set!

Set Lunch C (IDR 175 k++)
– Soup
– Sauce
– Mix Ball
– Special Mixed Beef
– Fish Fillet (Dori)
– Mix Tofu
– Oyster Mushroom
– Mix Vegetable
– Fresh Egg
– Handmade Noodle / Steamed Rice
– Iced Tea / Hot Tea

Our hot pot experience was pretty satisfying. Given a chance to try the original soup, we think it’s the best kind of soup to accomodate as a lighter neutral base in order to bring out more rich flavours from the other ingredients that we put inside the pot. I like the overall elements but let me point out two notable ingredients that brings out the best of this experience, which were the Australian beef and homemade noodle! To give a constructive criticism, the fish fillet could be better in terms of its freshness. 🙂

The beef provided was in good quality which had this marble texture that after a short 30 second dip into the hot pot, it was already cooked nicely which resulted in a tender texture. Personal tips, 30 seconds to 1 minute is pretty much the perfect cooking time for these fine thin slices of gorgeous beef.

The handmade noodle was my perfect kind of noodle. It had that good lamian quality and the texture was sorta bouncy, which I loved!

Other than that, everything else was pretty okay and the experience dining here was quite positive.

To sum up, Dolar Shop is good place to enjoy shabu-shabu with your family and friends. The place itself does resemble more of a heart-warming family restaurant. I think it would be quite nice to have a family gathering or celebration in Dolar Shop. After all, shabu-shabu is always fun when enjoyed with your dearest ones. 🙂

DOLAR SHOP RESTO | JAKARTA
Mediterania Gajah Mada
Jl. Gajah Mada 174 Penthouse Tud 16, Gajah Mada, Jakarta
Phone: +6221-6336880/81
Website: http://dolarshop.co.id
Facebook: Dolar Shop