SPICE HOLIC

I visited SPICE HOLIC, a spice curry specialty restaurant that opened on April 9, 2024 in Shijo-Karasuma, Kyoto. The restaurant is open every morning from 8:00 a.m., so we can enjoy curry in the morning. Doesn’t it seem that if you have a spice curry before work first thing in the morning to get your head crisped up, your work afterwards will go so much better? Imagining the aroma of spices in my head, I was walking along Takatsuji-dori where the restaurant is located…

SPICE HOLIC is a unique restaurant with an inazuma-shaped counter that sits in a vacant building!

Even though I was walking around with Google Maps open on my phone, I passed SPICE HOLIC once. At first glance, it was a little difficult to find the shop. The restaurant was all glass on the aisle, but the inside looked empty, although there were people there and the lights were on. I thought for sure that they were under construction to build a new store.

Once inside, I found wine glasses and bottles on the wall behind the counter, which could not be seen from the outside, giving the place a bit of a bar-like atmosphere. There are also bottles of sake and whiskey on the counter, so perhaps you can enjoy a drink while eating curry. The Inazuma-shaped counter that sits inside the restaurant is very unique. This inazuma-shaped counter seats 15 customers in total, and unlike side-by-side counters, it is designed so that customers do not bump into their neighbors. If there are two customers, they can sit at right angles to each other, so they can talk to each other.

SPICE HOLIC’s Aigake Curry is a great way to get covered in spices in the morning!

SPICE HOLIC offers three types of curry: chicken curry, keema curry (both priced at 1,300 yen including tax), and aigake curry, which is a combination of the two. The following items can be added to this curry as an option…

• Spahori Special Chicken 300 yen
• Kyo-no-gai pakuchi (Kyoto vegetables) 200 yen
• Melted cheese 200 yen
• Eggs cooked in umadashi broth 150 yen

But this time it is served without any toppings. You can also customize the amount of rice in three levels: small, medium, and large (note: only large requires an additional 200 yen), but this time I ordered medium rice.

After finishing the order, a pickle like this will be served first. It is a chopstick rest to reset the spicy flavor of the curry, but if you look closely, you will see that there is something spice-like in this pickle as well…

Less than 10 minutes after ordering, the aigake curry I ordered was ready. It is a little hard to tell them apart because they are almost the same color, but in the image above, the left side is chicken curry and the right side is keema curry. It is nice to be able to enjoy all two kinds of SPICE HOLIC‘s curry in one dish.

Let’s start with the chicken curry… The visual is riddled with chopped onions, and you can tell at a glance that a lot of onions are used. It tastes like an orthodox spiced curry with tomatoes, turmeric, cumin, and other ingredients.

The keema curry, on the other hand, has a much finer minced meat and is less chunky than most keema curries, but it uses more black pepper, celery, and other aromatic herbs, and the aroma is more intense when putting it in the mouth and hitting the nose. The spiciness of the curry is stronger than that of the chicken curry, and as you continue eating it, you will start to sweat, especially on the top of your head.

Now, on top of the rice in the center of this curry is a topping of cherry tomatoes and fried shishito peppers. When I see shishito in spiced curry, it reminds me of Columbia 8, a legendary restaurant in Osaka…am I being too picky about this? Likewise, I held the shishito in one hand and chomped on it while eating the curry. I wonder if spiced curry and Shishito will spread throughout the country as a “golden combination” in the spiced curry world? I am curious in another sense.

SPICE HOLIC‘s Aigake Curry was a dish full of spice that lived up to its name of spice curry. Thanks to this, my head was clear after the meal, and I was able to go to work feeling good, even sweating lightly. Perhaps, the curry here is exactly what you imagine spiced curry to be. In that sense, if you want to try spice curry in Kyoto, you will not be disappointed at all if you go to this restaurant.

A set meal with coffee is available until 10:00 a.m. … SPICE HOLIC is a 6-minute walk from the nearest station, Karasuma Station on the Hankyu Kyoto Line (Shijo Station on the Kyoto Municipal Subway Karasuma Line).

SPICE HOLIC offers a MORNING SET of spiced curry and coffee for only 1,500 yen (tax included) until 10:00 every morning. If you add coffee as a stand-alone item, the price is 380 yen per cup, so you save about 200 yen. Curry and coffee give a double punch of aroma! which seems to be quite effective for sleepy-heads. When you are in the mood for a strong stimulation in the morning, SPICE HOLIC is the place to go! Now, here are the details of the restaurant…

P.S. If you are looking for delicious curry in Kyoto, please stop by this article below…