In shortSeasonal kaiseki courses served on the okami's antique tableware in an early-Showa house that began as an antique shop. Reservations run in Japanese and are hard to place from abroad, so our Tokyo desk requests the table for you, by phone and in Japanese.
Price
Lunch ¥6,600 or ¥9,900 per person tax included; dinner ¥14,300, ¥17,600 or ¥22,000 tax included plus 10% service (¥27,500 and up by arrangement); one drink per person is required
Hours
Lunch seated from 11:30 with every table starting together at 12:00 (last order 14:30); dinner 18:00–22:00
Closed
Mondays (open when Monday is a national holiday), plus irregular days
Seats
About 50 across two floors, all chairs; dinner is two parties only, each with a floor to itself
Payment
Credit cards accepted
Getting there
JR Kita-Kamakura, Shirasagi-ike side exit, about 8 minutes on foot; taxis stop a few minutes short of the door
Kita‑Kamakura is the quiet end of Kamakura, the station for Engaku‑ji
and Kencho‑ji, and eight minutes’ walk from it, up a lane so narrow
that no car can follow you, stands a house from the early Showa
years. It did not start as a restaurant. The building opened as an
antique shop, and the name Gentoan was chosen to mean a place where
you might meet an antique as elusive as a phantom. The shop became a
kaiseki house, and the okami’s collection of pottery and lacquer from
those years is what the food now arrives on. Reviewers describe
squirrels in the garden, old glass doors that rattle in the wind and
a room to yourselves upstairs. The house held one star in the Michelin Guide
Yokohama‑Kawasaki‑Shonan 2015 special edition and was chosen for Tabelog’s Japanese
Cuisine East 100 in 2021.
What you eat
Kaiseki by course tier rather than by menu: the number of dishes is
the same at every price, and what changes is the ingredient and the
composition. At lunch there are two courses, ¥6,600 and ¥9,900; at
dinner ¥14,300, ¥17,600 and ¥22,000 with a 10% service charge, and
from ¥27,500 by arrangement. A meal is planned to run two to two and
a half hours, and the house asks for one drink per person. Allergies
and dislikes declared in advance are worked around within the course,
but severe allergies cannot be accommodated because the kitchen and
washing are shared.
The booking reality
Both services are reservation‑only. The channels are the telephone,
0467‑43‑5695, and an online form on the official site that
works by e‑mail verification, in Japanese; posts on the house’s
Instagram say reservations are taken from two months before the
date. Lunch is one seating that starts together at 12:00, and a June
2026 reviewer got a table for one without
trouble. Dinner is another matter: the house takes only two parties a
night, one on each floor, so each has a private floor of the old
house, and those slots fill first. Same‑day requests go by phone
between 9:30 and 10:00 only. Nine or more people, a private room at
lunch, or a children’s meal must be arranged by phone or e‑mail; the
private room needs six adults on the ¥9,900 course plus service, and
preschool children are admitted only under that condition and only at
dinner. Seats cannot be chosen. Cancellation costs 50% from three days
before and 100% on the day (parties of seven or more: 50% from a week
before), and headcount changes are accepted until 16:00 the day
before, by one or two people at most. The house may call back to
confirm, in Japanese; our desk places the call and takes that
callback for you. Expect steps, shoes off at the door, and a taxi that
drops you a few minutes’ walk away.
Visitors spending a morning at the Kita‑Kamakura temples who want the
lunch to belong to the same century as the buildings; couples or
families who would rather have an old house to themselves at dinner
than a counter seat; and anyone who values a Kanagawa kaiseki table
that can genuinely be booked a few weeks out.
Free release-date alerts: the day before, on the morning of release day (08:00 JST) and about 30 minutes before when the time is known — or a weekly summary if the house opens a little every day.
Gentoan: common questions
Can you book Gentoan from abroad?
Yes, through our Tokyo desk. Phone in Japanese or the official online form; the house's Instagram posts say bookings open two months before the date. We call the restaurant for you, in Japanese, and the ¥6,000-per-seat fee is charged only if we confirm your table — no seat, no fee.
Some of these links are referral links: if you book through them we may earn a small commission, at no extra cost to you. Restaurants never pay us to be listed or ranked. Editorial policy
Cite this page
Facts on this page were checked by our Tokyo desk. You are welcome to quote them with a link:
