shabu shabu/japanese: SHABURI

as of October 2007: REMODELING/CLOSED!

SHABURI
at Dun Nan Sogo, B2
No. 246, Dun Hua South Road, Sec 1
(02) 8771-5548

website: shaburi.com.tw Chinese only

hours: Sunday to Thursday 11 AM - 9:30 PM
Friday and Saturday 11 AM - 10 PM

$$-$$$

Kid friendliness: high chairs available though, not many booths to accomodate and lackluster service. be careful of hot pot with antsy kids, but have wide menu besides hotpot and frozen yogurt at the end of the meal.

Visit reviewed: 6/12/2007



Shaburi is a nice corner for shabu shabu in the basement of Dun Hua Sogo with a huge menu of choices (in English and Chinese)- you can choose from moderately price set menus of NT$399 or splurge on options like lobster or kobe beef for a lot more. There are also non-hot pot Japanese menus such as sushi, sashimi and noodles, though when I asked about their eel avocado roll, they said they were out of avocado.

The service can be slow, though they have a lot of things to bring to you. First the dual sauces, then your set menu salad and your hotpot items, lastly your drink and dessert.

The set menu salad is a bit sad looking, but they do offer you a shrimp.



The cheapest beef on the menu is still pretty tender and comes with an array of veggies including your choice of noodle.



The thing I like about Shaburi's hotpots is that each one is divided into 2 sections, so you can dine with your friend yet have control of your own pot. In this case, I was eating with a vegetarian, so we could still sit at the same table (unlike many hot pot places that have communal hot pots) and eat from the same pot.

I like the sesame sauce better than the soy chili sauce, which can be quite spicy, but you can ask them to make it more or less spicy.



The vegetarian hotpot comes with cabbage, mushrooms, corn, tofu, vegetarian tempura, tomatoes, taro and noodles. You can also get an upgraded vegetarian Mushroom hotpot which I assume comes with even more mushrooms.



I was pretty hungry, so I ended up ordering an extra plate of sliced beef, which made my lunch more expensive than usual.

The black sesame vanilla frozen yogurt gives extra brownie points to this shabu shabu place over others. You can also choose from tea or coffee and we forgot to ask for it earlier, so got it at the end of dinner.




We walked into Shaburi for lunch without a reservation and it filled up fairly quickly throughout the lunch hour. I would recommend reservations for dinner or weekends especially if you have a large group. It's a bit nicer than the mom and pop hot pot places for business lunches or family dinners, though keep in mind you can have all you can eat for simliar prices at such places like Mo Mo Paradise. However, it seems that Shaburi have sprung up in NY where good shabu shabu is a bit harder to find and made a name for itself there.

also spotted at 101 Mall foodcourt, B2

food court: BREEZE at TAIPEI MAIN STATION

Indian Fans
Yokohama Station
Sababa
Sweetberry &
Little South Gate at

BREEZE at TAIPEI MAIN STATION
3, BeiPing W Rd, 2F
(02) 6632-8999

website: breezecenter.com Chinese only

hours: 10 AM - 10 PM

$-$$

Kid friendliness: lots of options, relatively new and clean.

Visit reviewed: 2/22/2008

If you're looking for a casual place with something for everyone, or you don't have a lot of time but want to have a tasting menu of Taipei eateries, you should head to Breeze at Taipei Main Station. And with all the MRT lines going through the Main Station, you could stop by before you head home or off to your destination.

Essentially, it's a GIANT, full circle food court, with four main sections filled with lots of familiar eateries- Taiwan "Night Market" Chinese food; desserts/bakeries; Curries, and even a whole food court of eight different beef noodle soups shops to choose from. I guess you could have your own Iron Chef tasting if you wanted to. I'll have to give that a try next time.

When we went, we walked around the whole thing to see what our options were, and then settled on trying out the section that seemed to be where all the non-Chinese/foreign options were- curry from Indian Fans, Sababa chicken pitas and Yokohama Station's fried pork tonkatsu and omelette rice.



The Plata Sababa was reliably tasty (with hummus and roasted eggplant) and I introduced Sababa to my friend who enjoyed it. (Although I think the prices at Main Station are slightly higher than their other locations (maybe because of rent) or maybe they raised prices overall?)




The bite of omelette rice and tonkatsu I had were forgettable.




For some reason, my friend got some food from Indian Fans.The flatbread from Indian Fans didn't even look like naan, and the curry was watered down. I usually love Indian food, but the offerings on menu were not appealing to me- it seemed more adjusted to Taiwan flavors. I didn't see any tikka masala or saffron rice. This old Taipei Times article reinforces my gut reaction about the place. I'd rather eat at the other mall court staple, Indian Palace.



There is a lot of seating for each section with wooden benches and you can even take your food from one section to the next if you really want to eat something different from your family/friends.



Of course, you have to save room for dessert.




The desserts section is a white, brightly lit mod area with options like Xiao Nan Men (Little South Gate) do-hwa, Meet Fresh, Pinkberry knock off Sweetberry, Beard Papa or Oishii cream puffs, Movenpick, Mr. Donut, or various bakeries. There's also Starbucks or Mr. Brown coffee if you need a caffeine burst.




The pink and green branding of Sweetberry was just TOO similar to Pinkberry to not be a shameless knockoff. See the same shades of pink and green and similar font in exhibit number 1 from dessertbuzz.com! It's laughable that they even made the logo pretty much the same (but it's a heart). I guess since no one has heard of Pinkberry here, they thought they could get away with it. But I have!


exhibit number 1


exhibit number 2

The expensive price for the extremely small portion (NT$80) and even smaller portion of fruit was a big disappointment. The flavor was appropriately tart (like Pinkberry) and yogurt-like, but I was shocked at the lack of strawberries. I'd stick to the Xiao Nan Men do-hwa or soy tofu custard. If you want frozen yogurt in Taipei, then you'll have to head over to Yogurt Me.



Next time, I'd like to try Minder Vegetarian restaurant and some of the other desserts as well as the Beef Noodle Soup (Niao Rou Mien) section.


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market/vegan: i recommend IVEGAN SUPERMARKET

IVEGAN 愛維根蔬食超市

No. 54 Wanlong Road

文山區萬隆街54號

(02) 2395-0900

MRT: Wanlong 

hours: 8AM -10PM

Website: https://m.facebook.com/iveganmart

Price: $-$$

Visit reviewed: 6/2/2016

WRITING AN ARTICLE ABOUT VEGAN RESTAURANTS in Taipei has opened up a new dimension to Taipei that I never knew existed. Who knew that there was such a thing as a vegan supermarket in Taipei?! And it's huge. A whole basement level floor of fresh vegetables, fruits, packaged goods and frozen foods, IVegan is a curated, one stop shop for anyone looking for vegetarian or vegan goods in Taipei. Some of the items you could spy in your local market, Carrefour or Costco, but the selection here is varied enough that you could end up with a cartful of things even if you were just looking to buy veggies, tofu or household goods.

Opened for three years, iVegan is near the Wanlong MRT stop and not too hard to find from Roosevelt Rd., thanks to huge white and green signage pointing you to the right alley. Once at the entrance, you have to go down the stairs and down the long hallway before you reach the front of the market. There was a off putting smell for me in the hallway, either from the bathroom or durian or chemicals, not sure, but thankfully it was not evident inside the market. 

A huge array of fresh produce and veggies like you would see at most supermarkets is in the front, cheaper than the gourmet markets at Jasons or City Super.

Vegan kimchi, rice cakes, tofu, tofu products 

Fresh coconuts, pineapple and watermelons

Soy milk, sesame soy milk,  brown sugar soy yogurt 

Frozen vegan dumplings, onions rings, French fries 

Edamame, fruit popsicles, vegan ice cream

Vegan Instant noodles and packaged noodles, both chinese and Italian pastas, sauces 

Korean kitchen noodles for vegetarian 

Fruit vinegars, organic apple juice 

Frozen roti paratha, frozen vegan bacon, lots of mock meat like vegan bacon aka fakon

This fridge has some of the vegan dairy substitutes that I saw for the first time.. Vegan mayo Vegenaise, Earth Balance's olive oil "butter", Tofutti sour cream, vegan cheese  and coconut oil.  Keep in mind vegan products don't use any eggs, milk or cream.

Egg replacer 

Fresh breads and jams, peanut butter 

Vegan snacks, crackers and cookies

There seemed to be a unique selection of Indian, Thai, Vietnamese too- snacks, curry mixes, biryani mix, rice paper wrappers, satay sauce, chili sauces.  

Even spied a durian snack (shudder!!) and fresh durian. I can stand the smell of stinky tofu, but I cannot stand the smell of durian. 

Oatmeal 

Rice bran oil, olive oil sprays, grapeseed oil..

Crispy onions 

Vegetarian oyster sauce 

Quinoa 

An array of spices in large and smaller sizes - curry, fajita slice, thyme, cinnamon, chili powder - with English and chinese labels and nicely illustrated sketches 

Wasabi pepper salt anyone?

XO sauce 

Even can get bathroom, cleaning and kitchen products here. I even spied a glue gun! 

Veggie "pork floss" made from mushrooms or pumpkin 

Vegan chocolate 

Dried fruits guava, pineapple, mango and even vegan shrimp chips?? Haha 

Whew! So a little look at IVegan, Taipei's vegan supermarket.Did you see anything you have been looking for?