From Asian to Cajun

Jim and Nancy do not disclose the fact that they will review a restaurant before they attend, ensuring their reviews are unbiased and uninfluenced by their position with the Sun Day.

Just to give you a heads up, this article is going to be very strange. Try to follow along and we will explain it as best as we can.

Nancy goes “cuckoo for crab.” One day while she was drooling over her iPad looking for new restaurants that specialize in crab, something strange appeared in her search. She noticed the Little King Crab Restaurant in Crystal Lake. Upon further investigation we realized that the Little King Crab is in the same building as the Kirin King Asian Cuisine restaurant. Digging into it even deeper, we discovered the Little King Crab Restaurant specializes in Cajun boiled seafood. Our curiosity got the better of us and we had to go to investigate as good reporters do.

The site is an older building and has housed several different restaurants during the past years. When walking in, there was a gigantic fish tank with lots of salt water fish swimming around (their sushi must be really fresh). There are a lot of steps to get into the restaurant and also into their dining area, so obviously this restaurant is not handicap accessible.

Walking into Kirin King we asked them where the Little King Crab restaurant was. The hostess mumbled something and escorted us to the table that we sat at when we reviewed Kirin King Asian Cuisine back in September of 2024.

When our waitress who sat us came over to get our order, we expressed our confusion about the two restaurants in one location. She then said they also have a special room for Korean barbecue. Nancy’s blonde brain immediately went into overload. We embraced all of this confusion and decided on what better way to start our Cajun seafood boil than with a couple of Shrimp Egg Rolls ($4 for 2). They also offered mozzarella sticks, but that’s just wrong in a Chinese/Cajun/Korean restaurant. What arrived were two large tasty looking egg rolls. Our opinion changed when we bit into it and cooking oil poured out of the other end. They did, however, have a lot of shrimp in them, and like we always say, “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” Tell that to our doctor when our cholesterol spikes!!!

From China we traveled to Louisiana and decided to try their Crab Tastic Boiled Seafood Special ($53.22). This was one-pound of headless shrimp, one-pound of snow crab legs, sausage (4 pieces), ears of corn (3), and six potatoes. We had our choice of sauce and Nancy, of course, chose garlic butter. You also get to choose the spice level and we went with medium. What arrived was a big platter for us to share with all the necessary tools and even plastic gloves, if you are so inclined. Let’s talk about seasoning or lack of. All we cold taste was Cajun spices and no garlic butter. Let’s touch on the spice level; there was none. And what was really off-putting was the sausage. It was not the normal smoked sausage, but instead was fresh sausage boiled to an unappetizing gray color. In their defense, the shrimp were huge and keeping with the Asian theme, this meal came with a bowl of white steamed rice.

We were contemplating having the Crepe Cake dessert, but that would be too many different cuisines for one dinner and for our stomachs to handle. So, Jim had to go without dessert and pouted. I told him we’ll stop at the donut shop on our way home and get his sweet tooth fix.

In conclusion, we still are clueless as to what was going on at the restaurant. What a bizarre experience.

The price for our Asian/Cajun dinner was $64.67. Seeing Rod Serling at the table next to us, priceless…

Jim’s take: Sometimes restaurants can try to do too much and the results are not good. Such was the case with Little King Crab.

Nancy’s take: We reviewed Kirin King as a Chinese restaurant and it was very good. Stick with what you know.

Have comments or restaurant suggestions for the Dining Duo? Send them an email at thediningduo@gmail.com

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