Fancy some great seafood? There are a few good reasons to go to Kanazawa – one being the fresh seafood from the Sea of Japan, the other two in my opinion are the Kutani porcelain and Kenrokuen Garden (see my photos). The new bullet train link to Tokyo makes a short trip to Kanazawa, known as “little Kyoto”, all the more accessible. I spent two days, one night in Kanazawa a year ago (see my earlier blog and suggested itinerary) and had three good meals. Pricing ranged from a relatively expensive dinner at Koide where we probably over ordered, to two very reasonable meals at Intaru Honten and Yamasen Sushi. However, the quality of food at Koide made it one of our most memorable dinners in Japan and if you like fish, this is a good place to go. I didn’t have the opportunity to try Kanazawa’s most famous sushi master – unfortunately his restaurant Komatsu Yasuke was fully booked and he has since retired. My hotel concierge recommended Shinosuke, which is helmed by a disciple of Komatsu Yasuke. I will definitely try it my next trip there.

Koide (Tel. no. 076-221-5190)

The food quality is certainly high in Koide but its also comes with Michelin level prices. So the toss up is that if you are going to a good sushi restaurant, you may want to skip Koide. Alternatively, just give the chef a budget and see what he can do for it. However, our bill came to JPY30,000 per person including sake so we’re talking about scaling back a fair bit. We probably did over order – the food just kept coming. As there is no english menu, Koide faxed the menu to our hotel concierge who helped us to translate it prior to going. The menu changes daily depending on what is freshly available.

Yamasan (Tel.no. 076-231-1886)

This is a good spot to drop by for brunch after a walk through Omicho market. This is a simple sushi restaurant with some good sashimi donburi (raw fish with rice bowl). The staff are friendly and the house special donburi was good although I asked them to do one for me that was just uni, roe and crab. First thing in the morning – we didn’t need a reservation although presumably it could get busy during lunch time.

Itaru Honten (Tel. no. 076-221-4194, website: http://www.itaru.ne.jp/honten.htm#_=_)

This is a fairly typical izakaya with a good choice of sake and a convivial atmosphere. Itaru Honten has got all the local specialities – kobako-gani, nodoguro – although the quality is not as high as you would find in Koide or a specialty sushi restaurant. However, the value is good given that pricing is very reasonable. Our meal probably costs us less than USD30 per person although some of the dishes were a miss for us. I’d recommend coming here if you want to try some sake and just want some light dishes to go along with the drinks.