Great food!! The fried rice and the noodles were amazing. The milk tea is a must too!! read more

Kapitan - Veggie fried rice and milk tea - Asian Fusion Near Me - Chicago, Illinois

Look, theres no reason why this restaurant shouldnt be a huge hit because the flavors are great and very much needed in Chicago. Here is why I think its a flop though: 1. Decorating. This restaurant has huge windows and a nice spot on a street with other buzzing and busy restaurants like Koi. Why is it so much less trafficked? Because when you look inside, it looks like a run of the mill convention hall from a Hamptons Inn circa 1998. The furniture is unispiring. The decor is drab. Theres zero personality. None. People eat with their eyes and they also choose where to eat with their eyes. 2. Portions. Look, I get it that food prices are up and whatnot, but there is no reason why I need to pay average prices ($12) for food thats like 3 shrimp, a rice ball, an egg cut in half and a single cucumber slice. It might be delicious but it makes me fee ripped off. In NY, a Nasi Lemak is at least 3x the portion for $10 or less. The flavors are great, but why so stingy with the portions? 3. Joy. There is simply no joy in the restaurant. No music. No ambiance. The aforementioned dull decorations. Things just feel dead. I want this place to succeed because i really do like the flavors and hope Chicago gets more like this. But compared to the epic feast lates out on the website, whats actually there is a stingily portioned food place with good flavors but a decoration imagined by IKEA from 1999. read more

Everything we tried was delicious and unique. Nice space. Good service. We loved it!

Excellent Malaysian food with a nice staff. The chili crab was the best I've had in the US. The tending and everything else was really delicious, too. read more

Amazing food, amazing service. Only Peranakan restaurant in town. Think of this as Malaysian food on steroids. It's a definite repeat for me. read more

Great southeast Asian. Can't wait to order again and try more things on the menu. Very authentic, I high suggest the Chili Shrimp and mee Siam. read more

So good!! We got the murtabak, laksa, nasi lemak and dry pan mee to go. The laksa and dry pan mee were the highlights - delicious, complex flavors with some kick. We'll be back for sure. read more

Food is amazing and so is the service!! Clean establishment that serves authentic Malaysian dishes. Will definitely come back again read more

Great food that I've never had before. Laksa was my favorite. Kind of like a coconut curry flavor with chicken, fish, and shrimp! The whole chicken also came with this molasses type sauce that was also terrific. Very reasonable prices as well. Give them a try you won't be disappointed. read more

We just walked into Kapitan & the hostess was very rude. We were talking to him and he walked away. I think his name was Connor, but not sure. The food was okay, but very overpriced. read more

I loved this place. The hardest part was every dish was my favorite. They were unique and delicious The service was fantastic as well. We will be back read more

Unbelievably good Malaysian food. The Nyonya Laksa is delicious. Serving sizes are generous.

Great happy hour and surprisingly flavorful food. We got the beef noodle soup, nothing better in a cold day, super flavorful broth. The chicken Satay was some of the best I've ever had. read more

Great food, good portions, had the teow mee and the chili shrimp. Want to try the duck fried rice or chili crab next time.

We had Kapitan on our list for a while and finally decided to visit during our night out in the city. There is Penang and Asian noodle house in Arlington Heights area which are in our backyard and we are familiar with Malaysian food. Kapitan provided a different take on Malaysian food, with focus on Peranakan cuisine, we looked it up and there are a lot of history to the cuisine - look it up. We tried their Roasted Duck Bun, Chee Cheong Fun, Lobak, Murtabak - they were out of this world and great for a big party, easy to share family style. For entrees, we tried their Chili Shrimp, Laksa Lemak, Steamed Chilean Sea Bass, Roasted Hainanese Chicken and Rendang Beef. All these did not disappoint, everyone loved the food and can't wait to come back. The bar menu is extensive and their cocktail are impressive, they have a great wine list too, everyone got something they liked. Would definitely come back again to explore the menu, highly recommended. read more

Food was super delicious but the service not so much. I know that Covid has made things hard at times but we were the only people in the place and there was lots of staff about. They just seemed focused on other things besides their diners. read more

We dined at Kapitan last night, attracted by the broad menu of Malaysian/Asian fusion offerings. We were totally new to this cuisine and decided to try it out. Totally glad that we did! There is easy parking on Clybourn. The atmosphere is quite pleasant, spotlessly clean with loads of natural light from huge street side windows. The service was excellent start to finish, with attentive and knowledgeable beverage and food servers. We had the roasted duck bun and Inche Kabin wings as appetizers. As entrees we ordered the signature Malaysian street food, the Ramly burger (fully loaded angus beef burger wrapped in an egg omelet and bun), and the spicy noodle chicken. Every dish was so tasty and delicious! We are absolutely going back! Dr. P read more

Food was AMAZING. Seriously, take it from someone who used to eat malay food every weekend growing up, this place is LEGIT. We got the roti curry chicken, pineapple beef, and fried pork belly. This place has been having trouble getting customers so please come support them! read more

This place is amazing! Order everything. The food is subtle, aromatic, plentiful, and delicious!

The food was absolutely delicious! We ordered the oxtail soup, curry laksa, and the lamb nasi lamak. As for shareables we got the otak-otak and the lobak. I would recommend pretty much everything we got. If the food wasn't on the pricier side then this place would definently be a 5/5 but it's still a somewhere that I highly recommend you try! read more

Food was great in general, except that they missed our to-go order of Otak- otak. We had Hokkien Noodle, Martabak, and Buddha's delight. They all were delicious but a bit pricey for the size and authenticity of the cuisine. Will come back to try some others. read more

Street food? What a fraud. I just had their Ramly Burger. It was a McDonalds quarter-pounder with a egg for $12. The entries are in a rage from $24 to$40! I watched the two servers making mixed drinks. One of the ladies shook a martini for well over a minute. The ice is chips, not cubes. Of course, she ruined someone's drink. It is the blind leading the blind. One time only. read more

So yummy! Did a double date here last weekend and the food was excellent! They are still getting a lot of things together (drinks, server staff, overall moved in home-y feel) however I can tell that this will be a great spot! Recommend: otka otka and the duck fried rice. Our server was having a bad day and sent a TON of mixed signals as to whether or not we were welcome but when they are 100% operational thus place is going to be busy all the time. Go try it :) read more

My family and I dined at Kapitan on New Years Eve -- they have the big floor-to-ceiling windows that can open -- and my family ordered the Ramly Burger, Mee Siam, Nyonya Curry Laksa, Murtabak, Turmeric Rice, Teh Tarik, and Cendol. I, myself, have a lot of dietary restrictions due to allergies, and the waitress, the owner, and the chef were so accommodating to those restrictions. The chef ended up making a custom dish similar to the Mee Siam for me, and it was delicious! The restaurant just opened and it has so much potential. We got a tour of the expansive space; I'm excited to see how it looks as time passes and the pandemic ends, allowing for more customers and more events to happen! read more

Highly recommend! Awesome food. Great services!! We had a wonderful dinner at the restaurant. Would love to come back soon!

Food is pricey. Service is bad. Food is altered from original flavor, some changes are good but some are bad, I like how they twist the flavor of beef rendang, it's better than most places. But their chili shrimp is a failed, way to sweet compared to what I had in Singapore! read more

Would NOT recommend if you're looking for authentic Malaysian food. Had the Crab Fried Rice with Soft Shell Crab and the fried rice is soggy. Fried rice should always be dry and there were no crab meat cooked with the rice. Authentic Hainanese Chicken should not be roasted. No better than the Costco rotisserie chicken. Chili shrimp is like a sweet and sour with a hint of chili flavor. Everything was overpriced and lacked authenticity. read more

We drive by this restaurant all the time not realizing it was even a restaurant as the location has historically been a bar. A neighbor recommended it and we're usually skeptical to try new places, but this did not disappoint! We ordered the Lobak (fried pork) to start and that was very flavorful. We ordered 3 entrees to share between two of us for variety - the Nyonya Curry Laksa Lemak, Mee Goreng, and the Soft Shell Crab Fried Rice. It was all good, but the SoftShell Crab Fried Rice stood out the most for us. It was not your typical salty soy sauce fried rice. In addition to the soft shell crab, there was crab meat mixed into the fried rice. Would definitely recommend this place. We'll be back with friends to try more of the menu. read more

First time trying peranakan cuisine and really impressed. Everything we tried was really good, got the Kapitan chicken, the beef noodle soup (perfect on a cold day), and the chicken satay. Everything was very flavorful and fresh and the service was great. Will definitely be back! read more

As an Indonesian, I was so excited and had high expectations for this place. However I did not enjoyed my dining experience. First of all, the waitress did not take our temperature until I realized later when the owner showed up, they started taking temperature for other people. We ordered nasi lemak, nasi kuning and otak otak. The rice from nasi lemak was meh and they didn't give me cucumbers when it's supposed to come with it. The rice from nasi kuning was bad. It was like almost sticky rice texture and hard...it shouldn't be like that. The otak otak was not good at all. I was expecting it to come wrapped in banana leaves but instead it came in three little balls with rice. This does not look like the otak otak I usually eat when I'm in Indonesia or Malaysia. Also it was sooooo salty! I didn't taste the fish at all, it was like I'm just eating the seasoning. The dish was just so weird to me. The Gulai Ayam and the teh Tarik was good though. Lastly, when we checked the receipt they charge an automatic 20% gratuity! Now mind you that they didn't tell us prior and we were just a party of two! My friend who came here before said that they told them prior about the 20% charge and took their temperature as well. So our waitress was just bad and didn't do any of the proper protocol. read more

I love Serai, so when I found out Kapitan was from the same people, I had to check it out. After eating there twice, I can confirm it is delicious! If you like Malaysian food - or if you are just waiting to find out you like Malaysian food - this place is a must! read more

Went there with a party of six... including one two-year old. We all loved it. Particularly delicious were several of the appetizers which are unique and different. We also had the laska soup which was delicious. For main dishes we had a sweet chili shrimp, a couple of wonderful noodle dishes (one Hokkien Char Mee) was extra fabulous. There are a number of vegetarian options including some fabulously light puffy tofu. For dessert we shared Bubur Cha Cha, described as a medley of sweet potatoes, yam (taro), black-eye peas, cooked in a sweet coconut milk base, milk and sugar. Yummy. Service was lovely and our server was very helpful describing dishes we had questions about. The venue is airy, pretty and tranquil to boot. read more

Staff was so friendly and food was pretty authentic. The nonya curry chicken was very good, highly recommend!!

Good enough that i came back the next night. (And I never do that.) Still seems to be undiscovered, so come get some tasty food without having to fight the crowd. read more

I want this place to succeed cus the food was good and there aren't many Malaysian/Singaporean restaurants around. I've been to Singapore before and had the items I ordered there for comparison. My party of 2 ordered nasi lemak rendang beef, duck buns, tarik and chili shrimp. Everything was pretty good. Chili shrimp may be a little sweet but still very delicious. I liked the rendang beef a lot! I was overall very happy with everything but I won't be getting the duck bun again. It was just meh and nothing special for $6 each. This place is quite pricey but we have a supply shortage and price increase right now so it's understandable. I think the flavors from here isn't as strong as I had in Singapore and I'm down with that cus the flavors are still there but not as salty in my opinion. I have a high spicy tolerance (I eat 2x spicy buldak ramen...on purpose when I want something with a kick) so I can't really review their level of spicy but it's there. I didn't have the hainese chicken but I don't think some ppl in the reviews know there is a roasted version which I had in Singapore. Gotta say the place is pretty bare with very little decor but I don't think business is going that well since for maybe 2 hours there was only one other table of 2 besides us on a Sunday late afternoon. Since it's just us, the hostess/waitress was very attentive. The guy however doesn't talk lol but he is just there to bring the food to the table anyways. read more

We've now been to Kapitan three times, twice for dinner and once for lunch. We have not been disappointed. The flavors are amazing and the entrees are a good value. We have really enjoyed exploring the menu. Admittedly, we have not tried their Ramly Burger because we don't eat red meat. However, we've heard it is amazing for all of the burger lovers out there. We are adding Kapitan to our regular rotation. read more

Food was decent but somewhat disappointing experience. We had the roti with curry chicken (good, but overly expensive), fried pork belly (ok), lobak (good), rendang lamb (good, but not very exciting and a bit dry), milk tea (really good), rojak merah..... this last dish was my biggest problem. I bit into it and the jicama tasted straight rotten and bitter. I asked the waiter if it was supposed to be like that and he came back from the kitchen to say it had gone bad and it was NOT supposed to taste like that and that they would make a new one. Well, the "new one" was just the same thing with the jicama removed... so the dish minus one of the ingredients that was supposed to be in it, without any mention of the fact that they didn't have any fresh jicama. When the bill came they charged us full price despite the fact the dish was not complete. Was kind of irritated they didn't tell me they were missing one of the ingredients because if I had known I would have just said forget it and take it off the bill. Left sort of a sour taste in my mouth (literally) and I don't think we will come back. read more

Everything was amazing! We ordered the roasted hainanese chicken, the roti, the satay tofu, the vegetarian duck bun, and the fried hokkien noodles. All of the food was delicious and the service was excellent. The interior was also beautiful and very trendy. Everything was perfect and we will definitely go back again! read more

I am Malaysian and I love the food here! It's authentic and my Australian husband loves it too. Come here for great laksa!

The place is cozy. I tried the nasi lemak with ayam (chicken). It taste authentic and flavorful. Definetly will come back again to try different menu. read more