Little Lamb Hot Pot

We went in expecting good things. We were promptly seated for a table of 6. The restaurant had a decent selection of broths and ended up ordering the Mongolian herbal plus the Chinese pickled cabbage. We ordered about a 3^rd of the items on the menu. Everything was delicious! Our server was great! No problems until I realized I had one soda to many and went to the restroom. MISTAKE! The restroom was absolutely filthy! The floor of the restroom looked like it had vomit or baby diarrhea all over the floor. There was a combination of toilet paper and napkins all over the floor. The sinks looked nice but were useless. You can try to wash your hands, but your hands end up right back in the nasty soap water and not enough space to clean the soap off your hands. So I calmly walk out to inform the staff of the neglected restroom and proceed to sit back down. I go back in 30 minutes later to the exact same filth. It was all I could do to keep my food down. They really have some work to do! All that to the tune of a $ 210 check. I can say for sure we won’t be going back anytime soon!

First of all, this is not 100% Mongolian restaurant. There are prob only two items on the menu could be Mongolian ish which are pancake and lamb ribs. The seasoning they use on the lamb ribs and lamb bbq is really unpleasant and its too much. Whole restaurant is really wet and slippery and I almost fell on the floor when I was going to washroom. Almost every table is having hot pot (which is really Chinese) so this place is another typical hot pot restaurant in the Chinatown. Our waitress took a while to bring our drinks. And she didn’t get simple request (coke with extra cup of ice). She apologizes that her English is not good, I understand, but asking coke with extra ice wasn’t rocket science. Overall, my experience wasn’t that great.

This was okay. It was a cool experience, but I don’t feel it was worth the 68.00 we paid for. I couldn’t tell the difference in the flavor of the broths, the cold noodle side and the corn side were not very good, and overall it was just an average tasting. So much so, I’m mad at myself for spending 68.00 here when I could have spent it somewhere else with higher quality. Service was so good, for me, I gave her a 25% tip. She was attentive, and friendly and helpful … until we needed to check out at the end, she was a little slow there. But overall, I was very impressed with her.

We absolutely love it! Good quality meat, fresh veggies and several kinds of mushroom, tofu products, seafood, plus yummy appetizers. There are only two of us, so we ordered supreme beef slices, premium lamb slices, tong ho, Napa cabbage, mushroom platter, and tofu platter. We also ordered Mongolian meat pie and lamb kebab.
Everything tastes so good. The Mongolian herbal and spicy herbal broth are good. When you don’t feel super thirsty after your meal, you know there’s no msg or too much additives. Oh and they charge extra $ 2 for dipping sauce.
The service was good though they were super busy on a Saturday night. We got there around 6 pm and only waited 15 mins to be seated. By the time we left, there were at least 20 people waiting! Definitely go before 6 if you can.
We are looking forward to going back already.

After reading recent Unilocal reviews of another nearby ayce hot pot we decided to try Little Lamb. Hot pot is one of my favourite types of meal at home or out so the bar is high.
Pros: excellent herbal broth and Mongolian spicy broth. I had 3 bowls of soup at the end. Meat quality is higher than Lao Sc and Mandarin Kitchen. Service was excellent and responsive. We ordered supreme lamb, short rib, pork, veggies (tung ho) shrimp dumpling (skip that), fish filet, ½ off lamb rib (they do table side carving) and enoki mushrooms. $ 90 without tip for 3 people and we each had an alcoholic drink. The price is comparable to AYCE.
Cons: I read here that they are BYOB. They neglect to mention that there’s a corkage fee which makes it no sense at all. We ended up ordering from their bar menu.
Definitely will return!

Food quality is solid every time. Make sure to go Tuesday for free soup base or Thursday for 99cents veggies specials! The service kinda sucks because they either have no experience or they can’t understand English well. Just not good wait staffs all around.

This little gem in Chinatown is good, but definitely caters to the local clientele. 4 things I don’t like: 1) we had a difficult time understanding our waitress and getting things explained. 2) they don’t offer any preset combos, almost everything has to be ordered separately and if you want a large variety of veggies, it adds up quickly. The few combos that are offered don’t list exactly what come in them (ex: veggie platter does not say it has bok choy, napa cabbage, carrots, radishes) 3) the spicy broths have whole peppercorns in them, and when you bite into them it takes your flavorful, spicy dish to unbearably hot. 4) they charge you $ 1 for every sauce you get from the bar but don’t have taste spoons… so unless you are a regular to this type of cuisine, you don’t know if you like the sauce or not.
Now that the negative is out of the way, I really did like this place. For $ 40 we got a huge amount of food. We ate until full while there, and had two takeout containers that we ate for breakfast the next day. Had we known how much food would come out, we would have ordered less, but made the most of the abundance. The staff was attentive and patient with us being a little indecisive and needing more explanations. I have only done Hot Pot onec before in Beijing and ordered a combo with preset veggies and I only had to choose my meat making the process easy.
We visited on a Friday night and the place was bustling, but not overly crowded. We walked to a nearby bakery for dessert and were pleased with our trip. My BF is now a Hot Pot lover. Thanks Little Lamb.

Great place for hot pot. They have a sauce station where you can make your own dipping sauce, which I like a lot. Their meat and vegetable selection is varied and generally pretty fresh and seasoned well.
I found the broths ok, not great but they’ll do. It’s byob so it’s great to come here with a group of friends who are ready to throw down some serious eating. I don’t like it as much as Flaming Pot (which unfortunately has closed down) but it does the trick when you want to satisfy that hot pot craving in Chicago!

So overrated! It’s a modern setup. The bar menu is too simple. Quality, but simple.
The service was decent and prompt.
They had a variety of broths… I ordered the Mongolian herbal broth and the house special… Meh.
The food selection was good too.
Anyway, $ 50 for two females.

Pretty good hot pot for Chicago.
Pros:
— sauce station. hiyah!
— pretty wide selection of veggies, meats, seafood
— good service. they actually bring you the things you request (ahem, sweet station)
— different broth selections
— byob. no corking fee
Cons:
— NOT ayce. boooo.
— broths could be better.

Arguably the best hotpot in Chicago right now. Yeah it’s right near by Mandarin Kitchen and they have an all-​you-​can-​eat price, but you can get just as much at Little Lamb for the same price. But really the quality of the meat is a step above at Little Lamb, which is (in my opinion) what gives it the crown. We sampled quite the spread of meat and veggies, and left more than full. When ordering start with fewer dishes and order more as you go, rather than loading up initially and then have so much food to try and eat. There are many different lamb choices on the menu, but get the Supreme Lamb Shoulder. Even though it’s twice the cost of the lamb leg and both have the same amount of meat, the shoulder is much more tender while the leg is tough. Also they make their own fish balls in house with chives, which I absolutely loved but the partner disliked. For broths, the seasoned house broth is a great choice. It starts off not that flavorful, but improves as you cook more in it, and is a star by the end of the meal and makes the last noodles taste so yummy. The tomato base works in the opposite way, starting off great but degrading as more and more water boils off, I can’t in good faith recommend this, especially when there are multiple other broth choices. They also offer some small appetizers, of which the lamb kebabs are dry rubs with cumin on them, pretty tasty. Lastly you can check in on Unilocal to get a free scoop of ice cream.

My friend and I came on a Saturday afternoon and I am not from Chicago. I was greeted right away by the hostess and seated right away. The waitress was really good in explaining the menu and answering any questions. Overall, the service was excellent. The broth we ordered was the House special spicy Mala and the mushroom. The special spicy mala broth was overloaded with garlic and greasy oil. The mushroom broth was good. We ordered the vegetable platter, seafood platter, beef and shrimp dumpling. There’s a sauce bar where you can make your own dipping sauce as well.
Overall, the hot pot food and/​or experience was okay. The most frustrating part about this experience was we got these tiny plates to use which cause the table to get very messy. Maybe if I try something else besides the hot pot, it may change my review of the place. Hot pot restaurants are difficult to rate or review. You either love it or hate it. I probably won’t go back.

I really like this place. Sometimes I think the communication barrier frustrated the wait staff which can be a little difficult. The food here is everything and affordable. I love the plum juice also. This is great for people who want a romantic date night or want to hang out with friends. I love the fact I can eat different toppings whenever I come.

Hot pot galore, pretty much a staple in my culinary appetite as I usually enjoy this at my friends and family outings. This is my first time going to a restaurant for hot pot.
They give you a very extensive menu to choose every item, there is no pictures which is hard for me since I see what I like to eat rather than the word describing the item. Took me a while but I ordered all the items I can remember. I got the not-​so-​spicy broth (there are more than 5 different broths) and over twenty little dishes came to the table
Once the broth boils up and you can start to add cold items into the broth and wait and take it out in these wire mesh baskets to serve to your bowl.
I was here for three hours to finish all my dishes. I would definitely come back again.
There are plenty of parking and BYOB. The good thing about this is you don’t have to do any dishes when you are done.

Great hot pot with variety and even though it’s a la cattle it’s not too spicy.
There were two of us and we enjoyed the food so much we over ate.
The fatty beef was delicious as was the sweet corn.
The restaurant and bathroom were clean and the food was fresh.
Service was actually fine and while not five star a definite place to go to eat hot pot!

I had spicy herbal soup (the second one on the menu). It looks really spicy, but taste not that spicy. The herbs gave combinations of smell, which is not bad at all, but I’m not used to it. There are varieties of ingredients, which you can used to make cups of sauce yourself.
Lack of service a little, but overall is a very good place to eat with friends!

Rather traditional hot pot. Everything is a la carte. I wasn’t used too picking out vegetables separately. .i have only been to the ones where they provide a pre portioned bowl of noodles, veggies, and tofu. We got the herbal broth and the spicy herbal broth. Both were good. Though I was slightly disgusted with oil in the spicy broth… i kept spooning out the oil whenever I could. Overall it was good.
Just be ready that you are going to smell like hot pot after!

What a fun place. We have never been to a place like this before. Once we understood the basics, we were off and ready to cook! The idea is to boil your veggies, noodles and meat in the hot bot of broth that sits over the burner on your table. Everything comes ala carte so you can have exactly what you want. Try this at least once. It would be a fun group activity. Right off the red line, one stop before US Cellular Field in Chinatown.

Good food with horrible service. The food deserves 3 – 4 stars, but our waiter was so bad that we dropped the rating down to two stars (we contemplated giving it one star).
Once we were seated by the friendly hostess, our service pretty much ended. We ordered two beers and some sake. The waiter returned about ten minutes later with bottled beer and sake in a can. He left before I could ask for glasses for the beer or sake.
The waiter returned quickly enough to pick up our order (you write on the menu with a marker) without a word being said and we just assumed he didn’t speak English. He returned a few minutes later and told us that 2 items on our order were sold out, dispelling our prior assumption.
Our food was brought out and this was pretty much the last time that we saw our server. During the meal, our table-​top «stove» became so hot that our broths started to boil over. We had to adjust the temperature ourselves to keep the broth from evaporating.
After finishing our meal, we waited for our bill. We noticed the two tables around us were waiting too. All three of us eventually went up to the front to pick-​up and pay our bills. One of the other patrons made the comment, «You must need to be a young girl in a skimpy dress to get service here!» because our waiter was extremely attentive to the table at the front of the restaurant with four young girls seated there.
The final insult was that our bill included a charge for two dipping sauces. I guess they charge extra for the self-​service bar that has dipping sauces in it (something that we’ve never seen at other Hot Pot restaurants). This was particularly aggravating because my wife only picked up a small container of green onion and the other bowls were for eating. Our server never brought us plates or bowls, so I went to the bar to get some bowls to put our food in. Instead of arguing, I deducted the extra charge from the tip (my wife didn’t even want to tip our server, but I compromised with 10% minus $ 2).

Love that there are vegetarian options for the broth.
Our waitress was very kind, and explained the entire hot pot process for us newbies.
Overall the food and service was good.
Also the restaurant is located directly across the street from the Cermak-​China Town stop on the Red line. Very easy to get to!