Kanizen

I am a huge fan of Japanese food and seafood, so when I heard about a Japanese Crab restaurant, I was beside myself. I know that sounds exaggerated, but my stomach is very influential upon my moods.
The first time we tried to find this restaurant, we got lost and wound up getting there right when it closed. Disheartened, we almost gave up on it since Wan Chai was so far from Sha Tin (4 MTR lines to get there). On the very last day, we decided to try again and I am so glad we did!
Despite the fact that we didn’t have reservations, the staff very kindly let us dine in one of their private rooms upstairs. The private room was fantastic both for the overall experience and for the kids. Service was very attentive without being intrusive. The wait staff took great care in informing us how to cook and/​or eat each item.
We ordered 3 lunch sets (3 adults, 2 children). One executive set ($ 500(?) HKD) including crab tempura, crab shabu shabu, grilled edamame, chuwanmushi, and veggies, one Wagyu set ($ 150 HKD) including wagyu beef and udon, and one Crab Rice set ($ 180 HKD) with Matsuba crab /​salmon roe and the crab tsukane. Each dish was beautifully presented, incredibly fresh, and oh so tasty. I would highly recommend this restaurant for the food, service, and experience.

Kanizen is such a treat. It’s practically hidden on Thomson Road behind a dark, ominous sliding door, but once you’re inside: all you see is crab for the next few hours. My last visit here was a King crab journey fit for a princess. I felt unbelievably spoilt with crab, as one would be after a six-​course meal. The Taraba crab set came to around $ 1250 per person, which at first glance seems very pricey, but I can assure you will not be complaining about a lighter pocket when you leave. You’ll be complaining about a heavy stomach, for sure, and wondering when you can make it back here for more.
I’m going to run briefly through my set meal here. If I went into detail, I’d probably have you in puddles of tears and drool, so you’re very welcome for my restraint. To start: the Japanese tofu with crab, clean and just slightly sweet with crab meat. This was followed by some of the best grilled crab claws I’ve ever had, with a kani-​su or crab vinegar, then a tempura of crab leg and a tempura onsen yolk with a matcha green tea salt. I can’t even begin to describe how perfectly light and crisp the tempura was. Next came the shabu shabu plate, which featured the rest of the crab — its ligaments, and the shell with golden roe still in tact. We cooked the meat in a ponzu shabu shabu broth, with an assortment of fresh vegetables and mushrooms, then the roe was saved for the final dish — a crab congee. My mouth was watering double time after seeing the creamy, rich, golden rice before me. I was already so full by this point too; we had literally devoured a whole king crab between A and I.
But, for those that aren’t completely bursting at the seams, Kanizen leaves you with a scoop of sesame ice cream and pomelo sorbet. Thank you, Kanizen. I love you, Kanizen. Best friends forever, Kanizen, for real.

I don’t know about you, but crab is one of my favourite foods of ALL time. You name it, hairy crabs, steamed Dungeness crab, cold crab, spicy crab, I pretty much indulge in everything CRAB. You know how one gets the meat sweats? Well… if it were true, I would probably get Crab sweats! …ew.
Moving on, my friends know what a huge crab fanatic I am so they were so nice to take me to a restaurant that was especially crab focused. This place is absolutely, most definitely, completely, TOTALLY, a heaven for crab lovers like myself. Kanizen is a Japanese restaurant that focuses on the different ways to eat Japanese horse-​hair crab and mainly Tabara crab. We chose the pre-​fixed dinner for two and it had about 7 courses. Just thinking about this meal has got me salivating at my laptop. (Metaphorically) Once you walk in the dimly lit restaurant, you see a pond with ENORMOUS crabs just chilling. The size of these things are quite shocking. I let my waitress know that I wasn’t able to finish the whole thing and she assured me that I can, she was, of course, absolutely right. First came out cold crab meat with UNI and tempura fried egg on top. Heavenly, the egg yolk was runny and ran down my crab meat. The crab meat was sweet and perfect. Next came out the crab legs, which I love. Every course was spectacular. My favourite of all was the crab congee you make or can ask the staff to make for you. It was the perfect ending to my crab meal. I was so satiated and I cannot wait to go back.