On my first visit to Tsubohachi, we were fed a lot of the dishes from their grand menu - something that is already spectacular on its own. There's truly something for everyone on that menu. But when they introduced this seasonal snow crab menu, I knew it would be the stuff dreams are made of.

Firstly, I'm not a huge seafood eater. But I do eat prawns and crabs and my main gripe about crab is that it takes forever to get the meat out of the shell. And for some reason, I always get cut while eating crabs. But snow crabs are so soft and the meat is so tender and easy to pry out of the shell. My tastebuds are now spoilt by the magic of snow crabs from Hokkaido.

We started off with a refreshing snow crab salad (RM22.90). Matt isn't a huge salad eater but he ate a good helping of this, which should be a huge testament to how good it was. Japanese mayonnaise is my weakness so needless to say, I also had a fair share of this dish.

But nothing could have prepared us for the next dish - broiled snow crab (RM58.00). The natural taste of the crab is already so succulent and sweet that you wouldn't want to ruin it even with a squeeze of lemon on top. A gentle pinch of the shell will break it and reveal the tender meat inside.

Hotpot fans will be glad to know that you can also enjoy the snow crabs in a hotpot (RM79.90) stuffed with mushrooms and vegetables and tofu.

Otherwise, there's a killer chawanmushi (RM12.90) with the snow crab jus, which turned out to be a favourite for everyone. The snow crab meat jus on top gave the overall steamed egg dish an enhanced taste.

And if you can't get enough of the addictive crustacean meat, the sushi box (RM21.90) is just Japanese rice and a mountain of the meat.

But if you're more of a fried rice person, then you won't be disappointed with the snow crab fried rice (RM22.90). It has the typical trappings of a Japanese fried rice but with an added thickened snow crab broth, making it moist and absolutely moreish.

It is beyond impressive that the chefs have managed to create such an extensive menu around one core ingredient but that is what separates the greats.

They've also put the soft crab meat atop a block of rice and added a bit of cooked egg and salmon roe (RM35.00).

And finally... Put it into a porridge. This porridge is rich and the snow crab sauces infused into a typically bland dish makes it a must-have on a rainy evening.

Tsubohachi Izakaya

A2-UG1-9, Solaris Dutamas,

Publika.

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