Osaka’s powerful Crab Ice Crab doesn’t pull any punches【Taste test】

It’s a taste that’ll make you shout “Holy crab!”

Earlier we announced the release of Crab Ice Cream from Kani Doraku, a restaurant famous for its large robotic crab sign hanging over Osaka’s bustling Dotonbori area.

Unlike a lot of other uniquely flavored products, this isn’t just crab-flavored ice cream, it’s ice cream with actual chunks of crab inside. This was an odd pairing to say the least, so I headed over to Kani Doraku to see how it fared.

▼ Crab Ice Cream is available exclusively from the souvenir corner on the first floor of Kani Doraku’s Dotonbori branch.

Dotonbori was the busiest I’ve seen it in a long time. It appears that with the tourists returning to Japan things are getting back to how they used to be. I was also pleasantly greeted by an old friend in the 2025 Expo fist monument.

Crab Ice Cream is sold right out of a little freezer in front of the store, so it’s really easy to just walk up and buy a tub from the person working the front. It’s also 500 yen (US$3.40) for one 95-milliliter (3.2-ounce) serving which makes it quite easy to buy with one coin. That’s quite expensive, but considering it contains pieces of actual red snow crab, it kind of makes sense.

However, that’s about where “making sense” ends with Crab Ice Cream. After popping the top I was greeted with the sight of crab meat embedded in vanilla ice cream. There was a faint scent of the sea as well.

Not sure what to expect, I decided to go for the gusto and scooped up the biggest piece of crab to start. 

Right when the ice cream and crab touched my tongue I was blown away by the flavor. Not only did it taste like crab, but I’d say that it actually tasted more like crab than just eating crab. This should be good news for crab lovers, but I’m not all that crazy about the stuff personally and it was a frankly a little overwhelming.

The texture was alright though. Because the crab was frozen it had a crispy, icy feel that melted in your mouth to blend in with the ice cream smoothly.

Even when eating just the ice cream part, the crab taste was firmly infused. Make no mistake there is nothing subtle about this ice cream at all.

However, by the time I finished, I got strangely accustomed to the taste. After the initial shock was over the ice cream and crab seemed to become very harmonious. Unfortunately the cup is so small that by the time this effect took hold, all the ice cream was gone.

▼ The crab meat’s only at the top, but trust me, that’s plenty

I guess I could sum up Crab Ice Cream as like taking a cold shower. At first, it’s incredibly bracing, but you’ll gradually get used to it.

Shop Information
Kani Doraku / かに道楽
Osaka-fu, Osaka-shi, Chuo-ku, Dotonbori 1-6-18
大阪府大阪市中央区道頓堀1-6-18
Open 11 a.m.-10 p.m.
Website

Photos © SoraNews24
● Want to hear about SoraNews24’s latest articles as soon as they’re published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!

Credit: