the dolar shop hot pot restaurant 豆捞坊 - 1909 dining precinct

the best hotpot restaurant i’ve been to at a non-vegetarian restaurant. each customer gets their own hotpot which is more hygienic, i had the mushroom broth. we shared a variety toppings including of a veggie basket & hand crafted noodles. for only an extra $3 per person, we had access to a table of sauces (my favorite was the mushroom sauce) & fruit. our waiter was also the most attentive & patient person ever. highly recommend coming here.

food was really good! service was friendly, but still had room to improve, had to call 2 different waitresses to add soup, as one of them said she’s right back, but never showed up, probably completely forgot.

after wandering through chinatown to find a good hotpot we spoke to a local and they recommended trying this place.
from the start we could tell we were in for a real feast for the senses!
as ‘chinese hotpot virgins’ for my partner & i - our friends visiting from overseas guided us through an amazing dinner with spot on attention from the restaurants staff as well.
food is presented immaculately to the table - quite impressive!
look forward to many more hotpot adventures but this will always be a memorable night!

recently chinatown has turned into little sichuan with many new hotpot joints popping up.  if you are after a premium hotpot experience, then the dolar shop might be your destination. notwithstanding a play on the name, this place is nothing cheap, and i mean that in a good way.

satisfactory service food average and service average but you can't get what you pay for needs improvement in food quality presentation and service

the meat there was really good! and the seafood soy sauce was amazing, the only thing i not really like was its spicy soup , it was a little bit too boring to me.

impromptu decision to dine at dolar shop last night. got the table immediately as it had just turned 6pm. lots of people lining up as we left an hour and a half later. great decor. super clean. there were 2 of us. we ordered mushroom base, pork legbone base and sichuan base with medium spice. all soups were flavourful. be aware the sichuan is super spicy my mother struggled with the heat level and she is a chilli eater. ordered a veggie basket, shiitake mushrooms, fresh bean curd skin, tripe, banana prawns, pate platter which is shrimp paste, fish paste and beef paste. also ordered pork wontons, kurabuta pork and the wagyu beef and lamb platter.fresh noodles. everything was supremely fresh. i will say that the quantity of food ordered was excessive, when i asked the waiter if we had ordered too much she indicated we could order another dish. the amount of food we had could have easily fed a third person and we had to take away food with us! the sauce bar is exhaustive and should be put to good use. my only negative points were sometimes it was difficult to get a hold of the waitress for broth top ups and i had to ask 3 times for her to make the balls with the paste platter. i suspect she hates doing them because her balls were very messy. despite free fruit being offered post meal, we never received any fruit to finish. and i was never given back my umbrella post meal either. i will definitely be back but i think how your night goes can vary dependant on how good your waiter is. mine was nice but i think a bit new. and struggled with english. also when in doubt i say order less items and you can always add more if you feel you need it. maybe a set menu hotpot degustation option should be available for people who are less certain of what they are doing? also please be aware from a budgetary perspective this is not a cheap dining option at $175 this is without ordering market price seafood and top choice wagyu platters the quality and quantity per costing is fair but not a cheap night out!

a friend recommended this place and we went there on a busy sunday night. waiting was 10-15 minutes short and we ordered first while waiting. food and service was lovely (except the fact that it seems like their waitresses and waiter has no specific area with which tables they attend so we ended up interacting with 10 different servers and having to repeat ourselves) 😭 we also have to call for their attention as they don’t really check back with us for the soup. they also forgot 2-3 of our things which we only realised when we left the place while looking at the photos we took. overall food and meat quality is excellent except i wouldn’t recommend the prawns as it seemed average and not as fresh:( let’s hope they keep the quality up post opening hype :) ps: try their shrimp paste!

umm what can i say about this place except how much it has exceeded my expectations. we cannot stop talking about it and have recommended it to our friends and family. one hell of an experience guys. food, service, atmosphere, aesthetics, just everything was perfect. if you’re visiting, definitely recommend booking first!

i was here to celebrate my one year anniversary. definitely the right place if you ever wanna try chinese hotpot, fancy and healthy kinda style. staff all nice and cheerful, just make sure you made a booking ahead cuz it might take hours queueing when they busy!! however it worth the waiting!!

i thoroughly enjoyed my experience in the dolar shop restaurant. the ingredients for the hot pot are really fresh with great quality. i have never been to chinese restaurant like this. this is very new but interesting experience, and i loved having my own pot to cook my own hot pot without sharing with others.
the restaurant is well-lit and modernised with chef preparing ingredients in the entrance, so we got to see all the fresh food ingredients presented. i am rather impressed with their staff's professionalism and fantastic service. the waitress kept offering soup base when my pot was low in soup.
overall, i give it 5 stars and i will definitely go again with my friends.

i have to say this is not your normal chinese hot pot restaurant. it is 5 stars western restaurant serving chinese hot pot, the best hot pot i ever have in sydney!
the restaurant is beautifully decorated, very clean and bright. not only serving different grades of wagyu beef (omg, it's blackmore wagyu!); australian seafood and other fresh produce, they also have many choices of sauces in sauce bar, plus fresh complementary fruit cut in mouthful size which was greatly appreciated.
i had the combination pots of hot & spicy and pork rip soups. the soup tasted delicious, and the waiter kept refilling the pot when the soup were running low. i enjoyed watching the wait staff to provide table service for prawn paste. she scooped a spoonful of paste and dropped into my soup to cook for a few minutes, and viola, i had my own seafood balls made~
the restaurant was very busy considering it was just opened a few weeks ago. luckily, my friend had made reservation so we could have our table on busy sunday. i also like to compliment on the solar shop's staff. i was so impressed with their friendly and professional manners. when we walked to our reserved table, the cook behind the food preparation bench and the waiters greeted us all the way to our table. we felt like vip which was very flattering.
this restaurant is the best hot pot place to introduce "new" choice of chinese food to australians who are not familiar with hot pot. i can't wait to bring my australian family and friends to the dolar shop. the experience would definitely change stereotype of chinese hot pot restaurant.

it's the best hot pot i have ever had in sydney, the food is really delicious and tasty, the service is amazing too. they have a fancy sauce bar with more than 20 sauce, the sea food and the high-quality beef is also amazing

be honest, this restaurant absofkinglutely peaks all the hot pot shops i'v eaten in sydney. the best food material and unbelievable delicious sauce make its amazing taste. the perfect food shape and fantastic service left me profound impression. if you wanna have some tasty and superior chinese food, you should never miss this place.

went there two nights in a row and i must say that over the course of one night the service standards dropped by a mile. the soup in our hotpot was not refilled at a suitable time and the majority waitresses seemed like they didn’t care anymore. the food is pretty tasty overall and although fruit and sauce buffet is only $3per person, the watermelon and oranges were fresh and sweet.
a new shop with very aesthetic renovations, more suitable for younger people. the variety of their menu however is lacking in comparison to yuxiang hotpot which is a shame. on the second night the waiting queue was extremely long although almost half of the restaurant was empty which was very disappointing and they did not appear to be reserved.
in comparison to many dolar shops in china this sydney shop was quite disappointing actually and did not carry on the atmosphere that eating over there provided.