The famous local crab out in Kanazawa, Japan is called “Kano kani” named after the local area it’s caught in.

But let’s be straight here, Kano-kani is just a rebranded Snow Crab or Opilio Crab. It’s also commonly known as Zuwai-kani, Echizen-kani, and Matsuba-kani. They’re all the same basically.

I usually like Kegani or horsehair crab for its sweet meat and savory crab butter, but snow crab is just as good when fresh.

As a lover of all crabs, I was super excited to come to Kanazawa to try the snow crab. We went to the different super markets, fisherman markets and noticed a majority of them were ¥5000 or higher.

The ones downtown were even more expensive clocking in the ¥11,000+ range, which I thought was a little bit overpriced.

Of course, when you get to the supermarkets, especially towards the evening when they start discounting items, you noticed that there are some for ¥2000 and then get another half off!

I was all over this and wanted to try it so, my thoughts?

I like crab butter or kani miso, and I think basically the longer the crab stays unsold, the more the meat and the crab butter deteriorates. By the end, you’re getting a very cheap crab and although you do get a couple bites full of great crab, a lot of the wonderful crab butter is actually dissolved and gone.

I read an article by a Japanese person, basically saying that everybody thinks that crabs are not in season during summer. However, they actually are and can be very tasty.

The reason why summer crab gets a bad reputation is that there’s less demand in the summer, so the crab usually stays in the store for three days, or so, then gets heavily discounted.

Tourists like me, will buy that discounted crab, and realize that half of it has melted away, and say it doesn’t taste good.

Compound this situation over tens of years and summer crab gets a bad rap.

I guess in the end, you get what you pay for so it’s time for me to put my money where my mouth is and bust up for one of the good 7000yen crabs or something and report back.

I have yet to find a good heavily discounted crab with good crab butter.

 

This article is still a work in progress so let me know if you’ve had similar experiences or love crab as much as I do!