Conveyor belt delivery worked well for mass-market sushi bars, and now appears to work just as well for shabu shabu service.

At Hawaii Pot Shabu Shabu’s second location, in the new 808 Center at 808 Sheridan St., seats are filling up fast for the lazy man’s hot pot. (The first, in Kapolei, doesn’t have the conveyor.)

Where the trend in hot-pot dining has been letting the customer get up to fetch plates of dumplings, vegetables and noodles from refrigerators, the conveyor belts offer a win-win situation for both restaurant and customer. The restaurant needs fewer servers, and customers can sit back and let the food come to them.

Use of a magnetic induction stove-top reduces the risk of burning yourself, but you might want to ask your cardiologist about magnetic interference if you use a cardiac pacemaker or other electronic medical implant.

Just as at any hot-pot restaurant, you’ll be asked to pick your soup base, then pick from a list of thin-shaved premium beef, rib-eye, pork belly and/or beef tongue. You do have to get up at least once to assemble your choice of sauces. But after you have your main ingredients, you can focus on the parade of ingredients circling around you on the conveyor belt.

Pricing is by plate color, just as at the conveyor belt sushi restaurants. A yellow plate, typically filled with ramen noodles or udon, is $2.99. Green plates laden with veggies such as baby bok choy, spinach, won bok or mushrooms are $3.99. Red plates featuring clams or a varied mixture of produce are $4.99, and at the top of the line is a mixture of fishcake and shrimp for scoop-your-own dumplings, at $5.99. For the same price you can get an assortment of ready-made fishcake and fish balls, but I prefer the less rubbery ones I make myself.

While sitting there grabbing plate after plate, I realized the house advantage in getting people to eat more than intended. You inevitably grab more than you can eat and end up paying the price as plates stack up. While plates might look small, portions are more generous than they appear, packed in tight under plastic wrap.

Some ingredients — such as mussels and taro — I wouldn’t order at any hot-pot restaurant if I saw it written on a sheet of paper, but to see is to covet. Even 12 ounces of rib-eye ($22) and 4 ounces of lamb ($8) for three doesn’t seem like a lot, but given the six plates of veggies, dumplings and mushrooms we pulled from the line, we could finish only half the meat.

So if you think you want to order a lot, bring three friends, although only about six tables are set for quartets. The other seats are singles along the lengthy conveyor belt, which brings us to another innovation.

Generally, the hot pot is meant to be shared by many, to the horror of germaphobes. I know people who loathe the idea of other people swirling meat with their used chopsticks. Yes, we can use ladles, but that takes much longer than fishing out a hunk of beef you know you put in a certain spot. Germaphobes can now rejoice in their ability to order their own individual pot ($4 to $5) filled with a choice of eight broths, from original (pork and chicken stock) to mushroom, kim chee or tom yum.

Anything less than the kim chee or hot and spicy broths is quite mild so as to be indistinguishable from each of the others. The seafood broth earns its name from a single strip of kombu and clam.

Unless you’ve ordered the spicy soups, the flavor will be powered by the sauce blend you create at a condiment bar provisioned with ingredients crucial to Asian cuisine, from ponzu to a red curry sauce. There’s no need to be timid as flavors of garlic, red chili oil, chili peppers, sesame oil, cilantro, ginger and scallions play very well together.

Given all the fresh produce, there’s not much you can complain about — it’s food you cook yourself with your choice of condiments. The restaurant’s weakness is the deep-fried oysters ($9), calamari ($8) and shrimp ($8) coated in a thick, hard shell. At a restaurant with shabu shabu in the name, I’d stick to the main attraction.

Nadine Kam’s restaurant reviews are conducted anonymously and paid for by the Star-Advertiser. Reach her at nkam@staradvertiser.com.

BITE SIZE

New Tommy Bahama opening in Waikiki

The first Tommy Bahama Restaurant, Bar & Store will open its doors at 10 a.m. Oct. 30 at 298 Beachwalk Drive.

The new Tommy Bahama will feature three levels: a first-floor retail space, a fine-dining restaurant and bar area on the second floor and a third-level rooftop bar and lounge.

The restaurant’s menu will focus on regional Hawaiian and island-inspired cuisine using fresh, seasonal ingredients with locally sourced beef and seafood.

On the third level, guests will be able to enjoy cocktails, wine and local brews in a relaxed setting that reflects the Tommy Bahama lifestyle.

“Bite Size” documents the new, the small, the unsung.