Stem Japanese Eatery: Kappo cuisine in Burnaby

Stem Japanese Eatery is a local Japanese restaurant located in Burnaby. They offer traditional Japanese dishes in a rustic and home-cooking style. Kappo cuisine, is the Japanese culinary art of cutting and cooking with seasonal ingredients.

We’ve visited Stem before for Valentine’s Day back in 2021 – they had an amazing omakase deal. This review is based on another in-dining experience we had with our friends, ordering from their al le carte dinner menu.

Recommended: Read my review of Stem’s Valentine’s Day omakase from 2021.

Food review of Stem Japanese Eatery

Here is everything we ordered between 4 adults.

BC oysters ($4 each) + uni ($4 each)

To start off our dinner, we ordered an oyster each and added the uni option, making one of these around $8 each. The oysters are fresh from BC/Washington and are served wtih some daikon ponzu and green onion – refreshing and sweet! They also give you quite a bit of uni so it’s not a bad deal.

Wagyu and kadocha croquette ($16)

Next in appetizers, we have a big croquette (think of it like a deep fried cutlet) filled with grounded brant lake wagyu and kabocha (squash). This is fried really well and the squash gives it a little bit of a sweet flavour. Although I must say I wouldn’t have been able to tell if it was wagyu or just another cut of good quality meat.

Bluefin tuna nigiri ($10-18 each) + Hotate scallop nigiri ($10 each)

Next up we have a very delicious plate of nigiris! These you order each one by one.

Hotate is scallop and these ones are huge! Loved the freshness.

For bluefin tuna, they actually have 3 choices ranging from lean to fattest – akami ($10 each), chu toro ($15 each), and o toro ($18). I don’t remember which one we got, but I’m sure it was either the chu toro or the o toro. It was delicious, fatty and a very savoury 2 biter!

Uni and ikura hand roll ($18 each) + Bluefin negitoro hand roll ($18 each)

We also ordered 4 hand rolls to share so each couple gets to share 2 hand rolls with different fillings. We felt like the uni and ikura, and the bluefin tuna negitoro were the best deal. The hand rolls are pretty big with lots of stuffing inside and a good ratio of rice and fish. Out of the 2, I preferred the bluefin negitoro hand roll more.

Fish collar ($24)

This fish collar was off of their special menu so I’m not certain what kind of fish this was or the price, but I have put $24 for now since it is the price of their Grilled miso BC sablefish collar on their regular dinner menu.

Kelvin and I like to order fish collar or cheeks sometimes because the fish meet is really silky and smooth and lots of flavour, but it does require some chopstick skills since the way you eat it is you kind of pick at it. So if you are sharing this dish with someone, make sure you are ok with that!

Duck “tsuke men” ($21)

This dish has been on Kelvin’s radar for awhile since he is a lover of tsukemen, which is like a cold Japanese ramen you dip into a separate sauce. Stem’s duck tsukemen uses thick noodles and a soy dashi broth made with local duck, cha siu and yuzu zest.

It’s got a nice smoky flavour to it and it is quite unique since they use duck – I don’t think I’ve tried any other ramens in Vancouver that feature duck as the meat. Portion size is a little small though.

Staub gohan ($36-40)

It’s been awhile since we visited Stem so this item is no longer on their menu, but the good news is that they always have some sort of staub gohan option.

What is a staub gohan? Think of it like a big pot with seasonal ingredients and cooked with Japanese rice. The one in the photo features meat, but they always offer anything from firefly squid, to salmon, to beef tongue, ikura, etc. It is a really hearty way to end your meal and all the flavours soak up into the rice below.

Portion for this is smaller than it looks but good to share with 2 people.

Final thoughts

Loewe’s rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

We had a pretty expensive dinner at Stem Japanese Eatery. We did choose to do more expensive add-ons like the uni and also selected more expensive cuts of fish like bluefin tuna. Things add up pretty fast because it’s kind of like a Japanese small plates/tapa style, but everything was delicious and made with intention. Presentation was beautiful and all the fish was really good quality and very fresh.

Out of everything we tried, I would recommend their hand rolls, duck tsukemen and the staub gohan the most. But honestly, everything was good and there is so much on their regular menu and daily specials I want to try.

I recommend coming to Stem Japanese Eatery if you are a big fan of sushi and Japanese food, and if you have a bit more budget to spend. Their entire philosophy focuses on seasonal ingredients so they always have something new on their menu for you to try and everything is really high quality.

Sincerely, Loewe