Kaisen Don ($35++)!
City Hall Japanese restaurant kaisen don $35++ — assorted sashimi over seasoned sushi rice, the seafood lover's signature bowl.
Friday date night dinner with BB at a City Hall Japanese restaurant. We were in the mood for raw fish and the kaisen don is the bowl that lets you order a full sashimi assortment without committing to a chirashi or a sushi platter.
We ordered:
- Kaisen Don — $35++
Kaisen don is the seafood lover’s bowl — assorted sashimi piled over seasoned sushi rice, often with tobiko (flying fish roe), shredded nori, pickled ginger and a soft-set tamago wedge.
This bowl came with a generous slice of salmon, two pieces of maguro (tuna), hamachi (yellowtail), a few slices of tai (sea bream), ebi (sweet shrimp), uni (sea urchin) in a small mound, and ikura (salmon roe) glistening on top. Each cut was thick, properly chilled, with the firm-bite texture of fresh-cut sashimi.
Sushi rice underneath was the real test — short-grain, slightly warm, lightly vinegared so it carries the fish without competing. You eat it by alternating between fish-and-rice spoonfuls and shoyu-dipped sashimi.
$35++ is fair pricing for the spread in the City Hall area — the same bowl at a hotel hits $50+ easily. The restaurant was the kind of mid-tier Japanese chain that does the formula well without claiming omakase pedigree.
Overall: 4.3 / 5. 😋👍🏼 Solid kaisen don date dinner — would absolutely revisit.
