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    Kawa Japanese Restaurant

    4.3 (236 reviews)
    Open 11:30 am - 9:00 pm

    Order Kawa Japanese Restaurant Takeout or Delivery

    Kawa Japanese Restaurant Photos

    Business Info

    KAWA JAPANESE RESTAURANT ATMOSPHERE

    What's the vibe?
    Moderate noise
    Trendy
    Casual
    Good for groups

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    Recommended Reviews - Kawa Japanese Restaurant

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    Jessica J.

    After having driven past Kawa (about a thousand times), and telling my husband (about a thousand times) how I want to go there, I finally made it in. Too bad for him though because I ended up going with a friend ;) To echo the many other reviews here, the sushi here is realllll good. And the presentation? Equally as good. My friend and I popped in for an early dinner on a Monday night. The place was surprisingly busy for a Monday. We decided to sit inside which had a low key atmosphere. In quick succession came our glasses of chilled white wine, much to our enjoyment, and then our sushi platter! Let me tell ya, we had a tough time deciding because this menu is stacked. In the end we chose the crunch dragon roll (spicy tuna), amazing roll (shrimp tempura), and scorpion king (tempura soft shell crab). They were all delightful, but I think my fave was the dragon roll. I'm a sucker for tuna. These rolls came out on a decorated platter, with some stacked on top of eachother, and some kind dry-ice situation giving a smoke effect. So fun! Our neighboring table even noted they were impressed. I shall return. And maybe invite the hubby next time, lol!

    Kelsey J.

    Best sushi in the area! The fish is so fresh! Their takeout is phenomenal! One of our favorite spots!

    g Gyoza

    perfect food!!!The service was excellent. The server is very friendly and nice to us. Very patient gyoza was excellent crispy and well cooked inside! The sauce was very tangy and sour with a bit of sweetness.

    Pork Belly Buns
    Angela P.

    If you haven't tried Kawa Japanese Restaurant et, go right now. we had a great team lunch their. The portions are great and all the food was delicious! As someone who doesn't eat sushi but when everyone else at work/in the friend group does this provides the best of both worlds. I had the Chicken Teriyaki lunch entree which came with a flavorful salad! My coworkers got to enjoy all the sushi.

    Yuzu Chicken Ramen
    Steve G.

    We play trivia at the Third Street Market here and there and I keep getting the ramen. One of these times, I should try something else since there are so many interesting food choices. But I'm a big ramen fan who seldom gets it, so to Kawa I go every time. It's just really dependably tasty. The portion is good for a dinner. Nice fresh flavors. Have always found the staff to be friendly and reasonably speedy too. I just got the edamame as a side for the first time and that was good too. All in all, nice reliable place to get your ramen fix!

    Shrimp Tempura
    Cookie A.

    This was my first time. I ordered shrimp tempura. It came quickly. I hadn't time to drink my soup or eat my salad. So. No wasabi. Had to call him over. He brought it and regular soy sauce. No ginger. Had to call him over again. Got ginger. Ok. The shrimp was excellent. The veggies I think had cement powder as part of the coating. Hard!!!!! The broccoli was Mushy and hard. Yuck. Usually Japanese restaurants have a different soy sauce.....one that is not so thick to add ginger and wasabi to it. Not the case. I loved the soup. I'd never really considered the soup to be tasty but Kawa's was delicious. I think the chef needs to check his tempura flower. Eliminate the cement.

    Sasahmi Sashimi Regular
    John S.

    We were greeted promptly and seated. I was very impressed with the hot house sake of choice quality but also the large quantity of high quality sake choices in the menu. My sashimi regular order exceeded my expectation with a presentation prepared for an emperor. Highly recommended Japanese restaurant!

    Sydney C.

    So yummy! We enjoyed all of the food we ordered. We started with the dynamite shrimp. Came out hot and crispy! Then we had 3 rolls- California, Amazing, and Godzilla. We would order this all again. It was our first time dining in and it had a casual vibe in the restaurant. Service was good and they took note of my peanut allergy. We will definitely be back. Best sushi in the North Shore!

    Lico J.

    Enjoyed the excellent service here. Food wise, definitely not the best Japanese food that I've had, but a decent option in the neighborhood. The shrimp tempura is my favorite - so golden, crispy, light-breaded on the outside and meaty on the inside. The presentation and quality of sushis are good too. For the soba noodles, I was expecting the dark green / brown wheat noodles but they turned out to look & taste regular noodles. So that is a mystery to me. The soup w seasoning is good though.

    Megan L.

    Since I've moved to Whitefish Bay and discovered this sushi place is the relative to the Kawa downtown, I discovered new items that I enjoyed and didn't realize they had. My go to: Tuna tartar Tuna Dumpling Ninja roll Salmon sushi Dynamite shrimp The dynamite shrimp, although delicious and spicy, it's an extremely small portion. The tuna tartar and tuna dumpling are so delicious. Service is friendly. I love to frequent this place.

    Helena L.

    Decided to check out this sushi place and I was quite surprised. The sushi was exceptionally fresh, the rolls were absolutely delicious. Service was outstanding. The place is small but cozy. Definitely recommend this place.

    Miso soup

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    4 months ago

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    2 years ago

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    4 months ago

    Excellent sushi, I have tried the Incredible Roll and Endless love both have been fresh and excellent!

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    1 year ago

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    4 months ago

    Sushi was incredible and the staff was extremely kind! Love that they have outdoor seating when the weather get nice too! :)

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    4 months ago

    The best part of this place is the staff very accommodating, very friendly!! extremely well priced for the area!!!!

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    10 months ago

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    2 years ago

    The food was very delicious and everything was great. The service was great. The food was filling and yummy.

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    7 years ago

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    3 years ago

    Nice atmosphere, friendly staff, full menu quality food reasonable prices a nice place for lunch or dinner.

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    2 years ago

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    2 years ago

    Service lovely. Very friendly and helpful. Food was meh, unfortunately. Fresh, but no flavor. Small, local place. Nice ambiance.

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    6 years ago

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    5 years ago

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    3 years ago

    This was my first sushi place and we still go here often because of its high quality and variety even if you don't like sushi.

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    6 years ago

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    2 years ago

    i really hate doing this. Take out tonight. Chicken fried rice. Disgusting. Never again

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    2 years ago

    Unwilling to make accommodations despite menu note that they are allowed for an upcharge.

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    2 years ago

    We had a lot of maki rolls, hand rolls, and sashimi. We also had the seaweed salad. Food was delicious. Service was great. Nice atmosphere.

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    Room Service - Samurai Signature Set

    Room Service

    4.7(248 reviews)
    7.8 miBay View

    I'll start with the food is amazing. 5 stars. We've been there a couple times and it's consistent…read moreand delicious. Our server this last time on the other hand was terrible. Not the elevated experience you would expect from this type of restaurant. We also had a bday we were celebrating and there was no acknowledgment. We had one menu from the bar. We finally had to ask for more and her whole demeanor was I don't care to be here and hate being a server. Which made our experience not as enjoyable. Didn't want to leave a tip at all. You can do better Room Service. Even though food is great , it left a sour taste in my mouth to not want to go back :(

    We were looking for a slightly fancier restaurant and stumbled on to Room Service. It's…read morepredominantly Thai but also has a really expansive sushi menu. We ordered the gyoza, miso soup, calamari, short rib, crab fried rice, room service pad Thai and a few hand rolls. My wife and I also had the Phuket #3 cocktail. First off, service was friendly and amazingly fast. Drinks came out literally a minute after we ordered. The food started coming out shortly after. The gyoza was pan fried and came out upside down with a giant pancake connecting them. Cute presentation and solid gyoza. The next was the calamari. This was probably our favorite dish overall. Huge portion for an appetizer. The calamari was lightly breaded with togarishi and a sweet and sour dipping sauce. Amazingly tender. I got the the scallop, 50/50 and salmon handrolls. My wife doesn't like raw fish and even she thought the handrolls were good. The scallop was awesome. Super sweet with a dash of chili oil. The short rib was our second favorite. Super tender and had deep, rich flavors. Shredding the beef and pouring some of the broth over white rice made a perfect bite. The seafood fried rice was also spectacular. Huge chunks of calamari, shrimp, crab. The pad Thai was only ok. It was too peanutty for me, but my wife and kids also were generally meh about it too. The Phuket #3 was also great. I ordered it first and my wife liked it so much (after drinking most of mine) ordered another. We recently went to a Michelin starred Thai restaurant in SF and while we also really liked it, we all liked Room Service even more. And for about half the price. We'll definitely be back.

    Photos
    Room Service - Dining room Valentine's week

    Dining room Valentine's week

    Room Service - Crab rangoon

    Crab rangoon

    Room Service - Manhattan

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    Manhattan

    Lucky Ginger - Side salad

    Lucky Ginger

    4.0(295 reviews)
    5.9 miHistoric Third Ward
    $$

    Ok, so, I kinda loved my experience at Lucky Ginger from beginning to end…read more Myself and my dining companion dropped by without reservations and were able to get a spot at the bar. That said, I'd likely get reservations were I to stop by again. They're a bustling little spot and saw several groups who weren't able to get a table without reservations while we were there. Where we sat at the bar, we were able to see the kitchen and our food (and others) begin prepared which was fun to see (and also nice from a transparency standpoint). Let me tell you--they are hustling in that kitchen! I began with a berry smash whiskey cocktail which was refreshing and fantastic. For my dinner, I got the bbq salmon which came with a salad to start and rice and asparagus on the side. Everything was fresh and flavorful. The only small note I had was I would have loved more asparagus but honestly, I could probably ask for a side of that next time to amp up the veggies. The service was lovely and the prices were reasonable. Get to it!

    Absolutely awful service. We came in at around 5:30pm, and the place barely had anyone there. We…read moresaid we didn't have a reservation, so they said we had to sit at the bar. So, we did. But luckily my husband quickly checked well before we were served and saw there were reservations available online, so he booked us one on the spot. We were then given two excuses, one by the bartender and a different one by the host as to why they couldn't honor the reservation: (1) there were no tables available for us (note the place was half empty, but we supposed maybe there were lots of reservations coming later--nope, the place was still half full by the time we left); (2) we had to make the reservations 30-40 minutes in advance and we didn't do that so even though we did have a reservation, they couldn't honor it because we made it too soon to the reservation time (WOW--complete BS). We were peeved but decided we should just enjoy our dinner. BUT as we were finishing up, about 5 couples came in WITHOUT a reservation and both the host and the bartender gave each couple the option to either sit at the bar or at a table. When I confronted the bartender about it, she claimed "they weren't supposed to do that." WHAT?! She literally just offered a couple a table without a reservation. What do you mean?! It was insulting. Anyway, we will absolutely NEVER come back here. The tip we left was solely for the kitchen staff who were hard at work and doing an honest job. Bartender and hosts are discriminatory and awful. Do NOT recommend if you are looking to be treated with respect. Would give zero stars if that were an option.

    Photos
    Lucky Ginger - Hall

    Hall

    Lucky Ginger
    Lucky Ginger - Berry smash

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    Berry smash

    Krazian Fuzian Asian - Crispy Tofu Delight (Topped w/ sweet and sour sauce and peanuts...can also be topped off with Spicy Garlic Sauce )

    Krazian Fuzian Asian

    5.0(4 reviews)
    44.3 mi

    Delicious food and great service! Restaurant was formerly a bar, and I felt it was clean and…read morewell-kept. The server told me they opened a year ago. For appetizers, we ordered a Fresh Speing Roll, Crab Rangoon (made with imitation crab, as stated on their menu), and a special Crispy Roll, which I would describe as Nam Khao in roll form, still served with Romaine lettuce wraps. All were very good, and we would order them again. The spring roll had a ham stick in it, which was different than any other spring roll I've had. For entrees, we ordered the Pad Thai with chicken and the Pho with Oxtail, which was also a Sunday special. The Pad Thai was slightly sweet, and they used pho noodles for it. The Pho broth was among the most rich and flavorful I've ever had, and the oxtails were among the most tender and delicious I've ever had! The pho also had meatballs and steak in it. The menu is mostly Southeast Asian, and seems to accommodate all tastes. I would dine there again, and I recommend it!

    This family run restaurant has creative, delicious food and an easy atmosphere. I tried the Nam…read moreKhao, a crunchy rice dish with ham, cilantro, ginger and lots of other seasonings. The cooks paid attention to the small details, the food plating was beautifully done and everything tasted great. The glass noodle salad was refreshing and tasted amazing. If you appreciate a strong drink order a Lychee Bomb I will definitely be returning to try other entrees like the fusion smash burger..

    Photos
    Krazian Fuzian Asian - Chicken Laab

    Chicken Laab

    Krazian Fuzian Asian - Krazian Fuzian Ribeye Steak w/Bok choy and White Rice

    Krazian Fuzian Ribeye Steak w/Bok choy and White Rice

    Krazian Fuzian Asian - Oxtail Pho

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    Oxtail Pho

    Todd - Thai Larb rub chicken wings - not very spicy but delicious!

    Todd

    4.6(64 reviews)
    7.8 miBay View
    $$

    Super happy with my meal at Todd! I ordered takeout and my meal was ready very quickly. The worker…read morewas very sweet, and I even got an extra tender in my 3pc order- that made my day! The order of fries was more than enough to share, and the quality and freshness were very apparent. I am excited to go back to Todd to try the karaage and katsu! The outdoor hut/seating area is quaint. I love the vibe of this place!

    What can I say about Todd? I love their wings, tenders, rice cakes AND their katsu. It hits all the…read moreflavor and texture profiles I usually want and they are really quick about cooking the food to order. The staff is always very nice and if they are busy for some reason, they even have kiosks to order from as well. I'm Korean and love me some Korean fried chicken wings, but going here means I do not have to make them, make a mess in my kitchen, or have to spend time prepping everything beforehand. Yes, I know these are Karaage but they are very similar. I usually get the boneless wings just because I am weird and do not like having sticky fingers when I am eating, so these I can eat with a fork. The crispiness is always spot-on and I love that they give you just enough sauce to give everything a good coat and flavor but not too much that the chicken is drowning. I also really love the rice cakes that they add into the tenders and wings, it's like a nice little chewy treat to go with everything. Their fries are a LOT of fries! My wife and I have learned we can share one order of them. They have a bunch of varieties of seasonings you can add to the fries but I tend to get mine plain and just eat it with ketchup. I love coming here and their little outdoor patio is great when I want to bring my pup or just enjoy the nice fresh air as we eat our meal.

    Photos
    Todd - Kiosk ordering. This menu has pictures to see what you're ordering.

    Kiosk ordering. This menu has pictures to see what you're ordering.

    Todd - Chicken Katsudon

    Chicken Katsudon

    Todd - Outdoor dining

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    Outdoor dining

    DanDan - Sesame Chicken Bao: I guess it's  "American Chinese" because it's like a burger instead of a traditional Bao.

    DanDan

    3.8(612 reviews)
    6.1 miHistoric Third Ward
    $$$

    I have been to DanDan multiple times recently and have left full and happy (: I'd recommend sitting…read moreout on their cute patio on a nice day and enjoying some delicious food. If you like a little bit of spice I really enjoyed the Happy Chicken specialty and (of course) the DanDan noodles are a must. For appetizers, the crab rangoons and Sichuan pork dumplings were so delicious. We also had the mapo tofu dish that was great delicious for the vegetarian option. So many delicious things to split between friends My absolute favorite dish they offer is the walnut shrimp. It was so delicious and sweet, I will definitely be ordering it every time I'm back at DanDan! Lastly, we tried some sweet mango crème brûlée that hit the spot at the end of a nice din din

    I had an incredible time at DanDan. Granted, it was because of my Chase CC that we got a prime time…read morereservation and the meal was essentially free due to Open Table credit, but honestly, we were so happy with our experience. I completely agree that this isn't authentic chinese food, but approachable fusion that tries to keep it truthful to the flavors and presentation. The highlight of the meal was the peking duck, which they only have about 2 orders of a night. We snagged it immediately when we sat down and it can easily feed 4 people with the sides. The duck was juicy and cut into thick pieces, so it was more of a steak rather than a bao style that I am used to. Nevertheless, it was delicious and even warmed up well the next day. The green onion wraps were...strange in my opinion. They fell apart easily and didn't have the best flavor that complemented the duck. Overall, I would come back for the duck itself, but everything else was average or extra salty. Service was great and the staff are very attentive. Happy eating!

    Photos
    DanDan - Inside

    Inside

    DanDan - Smashed Cucumbers

    Smashed Cucumbers

    DanDan - Outside

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    Outside

    Sweet Basil - Sesame Chicken

    Sweet Basil

    4.7(224 reviews)
    13.4 mi
    $$

    Food, service, and atmosphere were all fantastic!…read more We were greeted immediately when we walked in. The place was packed on a Saturday afternoon, so the greeter gave us some menus and let us know we could order and he'd find a table for us ASAP. We got to the counter and the cashier told us it would be a 45 minute wait. We accepted this and ordered anyway. We picked a curry, a noodle dish, and a Thai beer each. The cashier was very friendly. The original greeter found us a table almost immediately after we paid and mentioned the beer is especially nice over ice, so we took his recommendation. Beers came quickly, but food did take at least a half hour, as the cashier mentioned. Table and dining room were clean and nicely decorated with warm lighting and relaxing music. Bathrooms were also clean. Food was very good and flavorful. The portions were decent. We were full, ate most of our dishes, and didn't take anything home. The original greeter came back and checked on us while we were eating. Service was fantastic throughout the experience. The food was pricey, but aligns with other Thai restaurant prices in the area. Dishes were around $20. The whole experience was worth it. We will be returning!

    I really wanted to love it based on the reviews but the flavors were not there for me for my go to…read morefavorites. I ordered Thai tea and it had zero flavor and not the traditional color that I grew up on, very light in color so light on the tea. Papaya salad was more salty than the sweet there is typically the perfect balance of fish sauce and lime but just wasn't what I'm used to. The OG wings were great, great flavor, great cook. They use huge wings but cut them in half. The mango sticky rice had a perfect amount of coconut mixture but uses a different mango that is more tart than sweet. They were busy, people order to dine in and for carry out. The food took roughly 35-40 minutes, which was fine, not mad about fresh food. It is a really cute restaurant in a strip mall with a good amount of parking, but it can be hard to find parking when neighboring businesses are also busy. You order from the counter and sit down and they bring your food to you. I'm glad I tried it but likely will try other places next time. Cost was roughly $35.

    Photos
    Sweet Basil - Self service counter

    Self service counter

    Sweet Basil - Panang curry with chicken

    Panang curry with chicken

    Sweet Basil - September special - spicy steak salad

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    September special - spicy steak salad

    Kawa Japanese Restaurant - japanese - Updated September 2026

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