Omicho Market Guide: Sushi, Seafood Bowls and Street Food in Kanazawa

Where Kanazawa Shops and Travelers Eat: A Guide to Omicho Market

Musashigatsuji sits at the center of Kanazawa. Omicho Market stands right beside the intersection where the highways meet.

Fishmongers, greengrocers and every other kind of food shop gather here, and Kanazawa residents come through for their daily shopping. The specialities the city is known for are all here as well.

Everyday shopping and travel meals overlap in the same narrow lanes.

Here is a guide to what makes Omicho Market worth a visit.

Omicho Market

Omicho Market is a market of about 170 shops in central Kanazawa, Ishikawa Prefecture. Shops selling Sea of Japan seafood and Kaga vegetables stand shoulder to shoulder, and the market has fed Kanazawa for 300 years. Locals call it Omicho.

Nodoguro, Sweet Shrimp and Winter Crab: Fresh Seafood from the Sea of Japan

Seafood is what Omicho Market is really about. Nodoguro (blackthroat seaperch), known as a luxury fish, leads a lineup that also includes sweet shrimp (amaebi), gasuebi shrimp, botan shrimp, rock oysters, yellowtail and cod, all from the Sea of Japan.

Among all of it, crab is what Kanazawa is best known for. Some shops carry crab all year by switching between regions and species, and locally caught horsehair crab arrives in spring.

The one that defines winter in Kanazawa is the snow crab landed in Ishikawa Prefecture. The season opens on November 6.

Male snow crab is called Kano crab (kanogani) and the female is called Kobako crab (kobakogani). Kobako crab is prized for the unripened roe packed inside the shell and for the crab innards, and it has a reputation for exceptional flavor. Its season runs only until December 29, less than two months in all, because local fishermen set the closing date themselves to protect stocks. That scarcity makes it the one thing to eat in Kanazawa in autumn and winter.

Small Bites to Eat on the Spot

At Omicho Market you can also eat your way from shop to shop.

The seafood shops serve gasuebi shrimp, a Kanazawa speciality, along with sweet shrimp, botan shrimp, wild rock oysters and sea urchin.

There is plenty beyond fresh fish as well: charcoal-grilled loach (dojo no kabayaki), Noto beef skewers and craft beer.

Croquettes are popular too. The Noto croquette made with Noto beef and Noto pork leads a lineup of 14 kinds that wrap Kanazawa and Noto ingredients into nodoguro, crab, sweet shrimp and Gorojima sweet potato versions.

Walking around while eating is not allowed inside the market, so please eat at the shop where you buy or at an eat-in space. Eat-in spaces open to anyone are set up in several places around the market, including spots away from the shopfronts.

Kaisendon and Sushi: Every Shop Is a Winner

Omicho Market has a great many restaurants, and more than 20 of them serve kaisendon (seafood bowls) or sushi.

They range from a small shop with ten counter seats to conveyor-belt sushi pressed by hand, to a place with more than 40 bowls to choose from. All of them draw crowds day after day, and the popular ones have lines at lunchtime.

We ate at a number of them, and the seafood and sushi at Omicho Market are good wherever you go. So there is no need to agonize over which shop to choose. Shift your timing away from the lunch rush and step into whichever shop has room.

Produce and Prepared Foods, the Shops Behind Kanazawa’s Daily Meals

Omicho Market is where Kanazawa does its everyday food shopping because everything a household needs is here. Twenty greengrocers, three butchers and 39 grocery shops. What comes from the land is stocked as deeply as what comes from the sea.

Kaga Vegetables fill the greengrocers’ stalls. Kaga Renkon (lotus roots), Kinjiso (Okinawan spinach), Gensuke Daikon (Japanese white radishes) and Kaga Futokyuri (big cucumbers). Only 15 items carry the name, limited to vegetables that were grown in Kanazawa’s fields before 1945 and are still grown on the same land today.

Kamaboko fish cake and tofu, dried bonito flakes and kelp, delicacies from the Sea of Japan. One sake shop carries about 500 labels, mainly from Ishikawa along with Fukui and Toyama. Everything that makes up a Kanazawa dinner table can be bought in this market.

Getting to Omicho Market from Kanazawa Station

Omicho Market is about a 15-minute walk from JR Kanazawa Station, or 5 to 10 minutes by bus. From the bus terminal at the station’s east exit (Kenrokuen Gate), take a Hokutetsu bus, the Machi Bus or the Kanazawa Loop Bus and get off at Musashigatsuji / Omicho Market. The market is right in front of the stop.

On foot the route from Kanazawa Station follows a single road, so there is no risk of getting lost, but 15 minutes is a longer walk than it sounds. Checking bus times in advance helps, and a taxi from Kanazawa Station is another good option. There are no departure times to look up, and the fare to the market comes in under ¥1,000.

If you come by car, three parking lots connect directly to the market. All of them have a height limit of 2.1 m (about 6 ft 11 in), and the maximum charge within 24 hours is ¥1,500.

Four spaces are also set aside for tour buses, given first come, first served with no reservations.

Meals, Snacks and Souvenirs: Kanazawa’s Specialities in One Market

Nodoguro, sweet shrimp and winter Kobako crab. Kanazawa oden, Noto beef skewers, Kaga Vegetables and Hokuriku sake. A visit to Omicho Market covers the full range of what Kanazawa is known for.

The bounty of the Sea of Japan and the harvest of Kaga meet here, at the center of Kanazawa’s food. Omicho Market is well worth the trip.