If you’ve ever seen the film Lost in Translation, you probably remember the scene when Charlotte (Scarlett Johannson) and Bob (Bill Murray) eat lunch at a shabu-shabu restaurant, where customers are served meat they must cook themselves on a table-top grill.

Later in the movie, Bob asks, “What kind of restaurant makes you cook your own food?”

Dokebi Bar & Grill is the only Korean-style barbeque restaurant in Brooklyn. A diverse menu ensures that customers won’t have to cook their own food, but the option is available to the brave.

The restaurant’s exotic and enticing menu features traditional entrees like Bibimbap, which literally means “stirred or mixed meal” and YookGaeJang, a spicy beef stew. All the sauces, condiments, dips, and kimchees are made in house, with an emphasis on freshness and healthy preparation.

My friends ordered the cider and sake drink, which was featured on a handwritten sign on the wall. Everyone in the restaurant seemed to want this drink, which is served with a cinnamon stick. Dokebi has an excellent selection of beer and sake, with happy hour specials on Sapporo and Yuengling draft.

I ordered a seaweed salad ($4) as an appetizer, and my friends munched on the assortment of pickled vegetables. Diners will be glad to receive complimentary kimchee, candied black beans, and other pickled vegetables.

The salad was an ample size, especially for the price. I particularly liked the candied black beans, which tasted like jellybeans!

Feeling unadventurous, my two companions and I ordered the (already cooked) chicken Bibimbap ($8), which includes white rice, mixed vegetables, chicken, and a fried egg, in a sizzling stone bowl (extra $3).

The experience of the sizzling stone bowl is definitely worth the extra money. When the bowl arrived to the table, the egg was still runny and the vegetables were raw. I mixed the food for a few minutes and everything was perfectly stir-fried. In fact, the bowl was so hot that I had to keep stirring the food or else the rice would burn.

Bibimbap is a lot of fun to eat, and it makes a tasty, balanced meal. The waitress brought us each a dish of sriracha to stir into the bowl as we pleased; we could make the dish as mild or as spicy as we wanted. For anyone really hungry or impatient, I would not recommend this dish; don’t burn your tongue!

Dokebi Bar & Grill
199 Grand Street (between Bedford and Driggs Ave.)
Brooklyn, NY 11211
(718) 782-1424