Higashiyama Wakon — Restaurant in Kanazawa

This restaurant is a great experience to have with decent quality food but nothing spectacular.

For $110 per person, or currently 16,500 JPY, it is amazing if you’ve never had an omakase experience before. There are worser omakase dinners to be had, and the price is almost a steal compared to American standards.

From the beginning, you are entranced by the setup of the restaurant as you enter. You get to see the chefs prepare the meals in front of you in very intricate ways, which adds to the overall ambiance of the dinner. Unfortunately, some of the dishes are big misses. While the dishes themselves look like beautiful works of art, they do not hold up to their appearance. Many of the dishes lack enough umami to really enthrall you, and some of the fish tasted underwhelming.

To improve upon the meal, pair the dishes with the recommended sake pairings of the night. I felt perhaps the sake made the food better until I stopped drinking midway through the courses.

Nonetheless, this meal makes a great dinner date, and is one of few restaurants catering to this style of meals within the city. The staff are all wonderful, and will ensure you have a good time.

For the most outstanding experience, reserve a time after dark, and if you have more than a 10 min commute, take a taxi for about 1,200-2,000 JPY. The taxi isn’t necessary given the short distances between most hotels in the city, but it adds to the...

Higashiyama Wakon, is housed at the rear of maki no ono. The entrance is discreet and hidden in a long narrow corridor that hugs the ryokan. The dining establishment looks out into the manicured gardens of the ryokan and serves as calming backdrop to the intimate 10 seater establishment. The cuisine is modern kaiseki and prepared kappa style where we were given a front row counter seat to the detailed preparations of culinary journey we had. I had one of my best meals to date in Japan. The team here deserves a star!

The menu showcases the expertise of the team and runs the gamut of traditional Japanese cooking styles. The food is 80% from the local Ishikawa prefecture. I particularly enjoyed the tempura Zuccini flower, trout bracken sushi and deer to name a few. The wine and sake pairings are also excellent. Highly recommended for the food or...

We absolutely loved the food and the experience. The chef and his staff went out of their way to make us feel welcome and took the time to explain the dishes in English.

While we enjoyed the whole menu I will mention the ones that really stuck out Udo Squid Wild vegetables and shrimp Asparagus Sea Urchin Cabbage Trout The strawberry and cherry blossom (salty crust leaf) were heavenly.

I hope to be able to come back again.

Congratulations to the chef and all the team on creating such a wonderful representation of regional products.

The wine list is...