Japan’s curry specialist Caligari has opened their first overseas location in Hong Kong. This Tokyo-based restaurant boasts accolades such as nabbing first place in 2019 and 2023 at the Kanda Curry Grand Prix, an annual event held in Japan to crown the country’s best curry. Currently, the restaurant ranks as one of Japan’s 100 best curry restaurants on Tabelog, one of the country’s most popular restaurant apps.
Caligari’s Hong Kong outpost is located in a bustling area in Central but the restaurant is tucked away in an inconspicuous corner of the Entertainment Building, creating a comforting environment to enjoy your food. The restaurant has an understated white interior, complemented by accents from dark wooden furniture and fixtures. I visited Caligari at noon on a Saturday and to my surprise, there were only a few customers dining at the restaurant.
Differentiating itself from other curry restaurants in Japan, Caligari uses a unique blend of spices like fennel, cumin, coriander, cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, as well as mustard seeds to add depth in their curries. By simmering their curries at high pressure and temperatures for eight to 12 hours, the restaurant achieves distinctly rich flavours. Customers can opt for rice sets served with Caligari’s signature curry – a harmonious blend of chicken and pork cooked down with coconut milk to render subtle flavours – or the premium spices curry – a velvety sauce that contains a dash of coconut milk and the natural essences of the ingredients to retain maximum flavours.
For customers who want to enjoy both sauces for their meal, Caligari offers the Akiba combo ($188) which comes with turmeric rice and toppings like chicken breast, shredded cheese, potato wedges, coriander, eggplant, as well as a quail egg. Each of Caligari’s sets come with a daily appetiser and a drink of choice; and customers are welcome to add toppings like crab cream croquette, potato wedges, or burdock chips for an additional cost of $25.
I opted for the dual combo and received a portion of chilled spinach for my appetiser. The spinach was topped with bonito flakes and had a light dashi dressing, which proved to be a light palate cleanser in between enjoying the curry dish. The main course arrived fairly quickly, piping hot. One thing I appreciate is the careful plating of their rice between the two sauces in the Akiba set, allowing customers to savour the flavours in each curry without them mixing together. Personally, I lean towards the Caligari curry for its fragrant coconut milk aroma that complements rather than masks the flavour of the toppings. In contrast, the premium spices curry has a chunkier texture and gradually overpowers the other components of the dish as you dig in.
Out of all the toppings in the set, the standout was the eggplant with its crispy batter that remained crunchy until the end of the meal. On the other hand, the potato wedges lose their crunch quickly, and become soggy throughout the eating experience, so it's best to eat them first. I also tried the crab cream croquette ($25) as an additional topping, which had a delightfully crisp exterior and a creamy filling laced with thin shreds of crab. Much like the dashi broth in the spinach appetiser dish, the croquette’s cream filling provides a contrasting flavour from Caligari’s rich curries, adding another dimension to the meal.
Overall, Caligari provides an elevated experience to standard Japanese curries that can be found in Hong Kong. While the presentation may be simple, their flavours certainly knock other competitors out of the park. That being said, expect to pay Central price points if you come to try their food.
Here’s what our star ratings mean:
★: Not recommended
★★: A disappointing experience
★★★: A good experience
★★★★: A very good to great experience
★★★★★: An outstanding experience
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