Hapa Umi was the higher-end restaurant of the Hapa Izakaya chain. From hearing much feedback from the customers, they decided to change Hapa Umi into Hapa Izakaya Coal Harbour. The prices are much lower and you will be having similar items to the other Hapa Izakaya restaurants.
Flo heard about the Grand Opening and how the first 40 people to make a reservation gets 30% off through Twitter. Since we like deals we quickly made a reservation online and came here after work. I also forgot my memory card at home, so I’m sorry the pictures aren’t as good.
The interior is the same and has a nice modern vibe. The hostess and the service was really good.
Kakuni ($10.99) is braised pork belly green pepper sauce and grilled garlic bread. This was my favorite dish. The pork belly literally just melts in your mouth and the green pepper sauce accompanies it very well. Definitely something you need to try!
Just look at that pork belly! If you are afraid of fat, just eat it! Sometimes fat is good for you. Flo and I just gobbled this whole dish quite quickly. YUMMM.
Seafood Rissotto Ishiyaki ($11.49) has scallops, squid, halibut, mushrooms, parmesan, shiso leaves and yuzu zest. It’s like a soupy rice in a stone bowl. It was good, but we both didn’t like the addition of the shiso leaves. It just has a minty taste to it. Just a personal preference.
Trout carpaccio ($10.99) has salmon style steel head trout with potato wedges, grainy mustard, vinaigrette and wasabi sour cream. This dish was quite different from any other carpaccio dish I’ve seen. The trout really looked like salmon, but was very delicious. At times I found that the potatoes were a weird pairing with the salmon. But… that’s just me since I’m not a potato person. Regardless, it was something new that no other izakaya place has created.
Ebi mayo ($8.99) is tempura wild shrimp and spicy mayo sauce. This was a disappointing dish since we both felt the tempura of the shrimp became very mushy because of the sauce. Flo said she preferred the mayo on the side.
A good thing about this dish is that the shrimp is quite large!
Banana Chocolate Cake was good, but different for a place like Hapa Izakaya. The banana bread has lots of chocolate chips inside but I felt like the cake could be much warmer. This dessert was just so-so.
Overall, it was great to see the change in their menu be similar to their other locations. If you like the other Hapa Izakaya locations, you’ll like this one too.
Words of Wisdom:
- Great taste
- Order their Fresh Sheet items
- Can get a bit expensive
- More higher end compared to other Japanese Izakaya Restaurants
- Great place for special occasions
We Rate Hapa Izakaya Coal Harbour: 
Address:
909 W Cordova St
Vancouver, BC
Website:
http://hapaizakaya.com/
