Incheon shabu-shabu dinner with white tremella mushroom: Shabuway

This time I visited Shabuway Ruwon City Cheongna Branch, a swanky all-you-can-eat shabu-shabu spot near Gajeong Station in Ruwon City!! You can enjoy shabu-shabu along with a salad bar full of different foods, so it's a great place for a date, a night out, or a work dinner too 🫶

Where is Shabuway Ruwon City Cheongna Branch, and where do you park?

Shabuway Ruwon City Cheongna Branch 📌 11 Yeomgok-ro 464beon-gil, Seohae-gu, Incheon, South Korea, 2nd floor, Ruwon Top Plaza ⏰ Daily 11:30–21:30 (weekday break time 15:30–17:00)

Shabuway Ruwon City Cheongna Branch is a 5-minute walk from Exit 4 of Gajeong Station, so it's very convenient to reach by public transit. It's located in the Ruwon Top Plaza shopping complex, so if you're driving, you can use the underground parking at Ruwon Top Plaza!!

The restaurant itself is pretty spacious. The tables are set with generous spacing, and there's seating from 4-person tables to group seating, so it's a good place to visit for family gatherings too!

How much is it? Weekday lunch ₩24,900, dinner ₩29,900

Shabuway has different prices for weekdays versus weekends and holidays — weekday lunch is ₩24,900 / weekday dinner is ₩29,900. Since lunch and dinner prices differ, visiting for lunch is the more reasonable choice haha

Prime shabu-shabu all-you-can-eat dinner: ₩29,900 per person

What's on the self-bar: mala xiangguo, smoked duck, sweet and sour pork

Shabuway's biggest draw is that you can enjoy shabu-shabu together with a wide range of buffet dishes. At the self-bar there are fresh vegetables and various meats to put in the shabu-shabu, plus buffet dishes like mala xiangguo, smoked duck, and sweet and sour pork (찹쌀탕수육) on the side!!

There's a wide variety of meat too, so just grab whatever suits your taste 👍

There were also ingredients for rice paper wraps (월남쌈), but since we wanted to focus on the shabu-shabu and buffet food, we skipped the wraps this time ㅠ Next time I'm definitely getting them!! Pick your battles 👍

You need sauce to dip your rice paper wraps or shabu-shabu into, right? There's a sauce bar at the self-bar area with chilli, sesame, and ponzu sauce, so you can mix a sauce to your own taste. The self-bar was really clean and well laid out, and the interior felt upscale too haha

Half golden shiitake broth, half spicy broth for ₩2,000 more

You can choose the shabu-shabu broth as a half-and-half, so we went with golden mushroom broth and spicy broth. The spicy broth costs an extra ₩2,000! The golden mushroom broth is made by steeping shiitake mushrooms, giving a clear, clean flavor. If you like a light, delicate taste, you'll really love the golden mushroom broth 🫶

Alongside the light broth there's also the spicy broth for eating with a kick, which cuts through richness — even as someone who can't handle much spice, it was just spicy enough for a satisfying, tangy meal!!

There's a basic serving of vegetables and meat, and if you need more, you just grab it yourself from the self-bar. We added vegetables and meat to the golden mushroom broth and spicy broth in the right amounts and waited for it to come to a bubbling boil.

The meats: prime-grade beef chuck, beef brisket and pork neck

The vegetables were really fresh, and Shabuway uses prime-grade beef chuck. It's USDA Prime grade with really good marbling, so the meat quality is genuinely excellent. Besides chuck, there's beef brisket, pork neck, and more, so you can pick according to your taste!

While waiting for things to cook, we tried the food we'd brought from the self-bar first haha. We mostly grabbed meat dishes — sweet and sour pork, mala xiangguo, smoked duck — and tasted each one, and the quality was really good!

Add as much meat as you like and as many of your favorite vegetables as you want, and once they wilt down, that's the moment to dig in. I love a light flavor, so I mostly ate from the golden mushroom broth, and the juiciness and texture of the vegetables and meat in that clean broth was really delicious 👍

Shabu-shabu with white tremella mushroom

Shabu-shabu is also great as a diet-friendly meal, so it's really easy to eat without guilt!! Other shabu-shabu places don't usually have white tremella mushroom, but Shabuway has the white tremella mushroom I love. My partner isn't into mala, so we didn't order the mala broth, but if you love mala tang, adding white tremella mushroom to the mala broth would probably be amazing haha

Two-color fresh kalguksu noodles, worth it even when full

After the buffet food and shabu-shabu, I genuinely felt like I was about to burst. Still, there's no giving up on kalguksu (칼국수, knife-cut noodle soup)!! The noodles come as a two-color kalguksu made with fresh noodles. Maybe because they're fresh, the noodles cooked really quickly haha

We waited until they were properly cooked and took a bite — and this is something you have to eat even if you're full. The noodles were chewy and springy, on a completely different level from other kalguksu. Both my partner and I took a bite and agreed you absolutely have to eat the kalguksu 👍 After the kalguksu, there was no way we could manage the porridge (죽), so sadly we skipped it...

Finishing with milk ice cream and toppings

Still, you can't skip dessert!! There's milk ice cream ready for dessert, and quite a few kinds of toppings to go with the ice cream too. Piling different toppings on top of the ice cream makes it doubly sweet haha. After finishing off the ice cream, I was so full there was absolutely no room left! If you go to Shabuway, you'll really get a hearty, filling meal 😆

Shabuway Ruwon City Cheongna Branch is a place where you can enjoy shabu-shabu together with a wide-ranging salad bar, and try various meats like beef, beef brisket, and pork neck. With everything from vegetables to sides to dessert ready to go, it's a really good spot for family gatherings, dates, or work dinners!! If you want to enjoy a hearty shabu-shabu in Ruwon City, I fully recommend Shabuway Ruwon City Cheongna Branch.