Palate Adventure: The Captain’s Boil
My husband is a seafood lover, since the very first time that I heard about the opening of The Captain’s Boil in Winnipeg, I promised to him that we’ll be one of the first guests of this seafood place. When we had the chance to dine today, it was actually our second attempt to come. A week after it opened in Winnipeg in December 29, 2017, I tried to call ahead and make a reservation, unfortunately, I was told that they do not take reservations as of that time. It was understandable, they were crazy busy and some of my friends who tried coming to the place told me that they had to wait in line to be seated.
After hearing the mass today, I told my husband that we’ll have seafood for lunch – off we go to The Captain’s Boil which is 26 minutes drive from our location. The restaurant opens at 11:00 am and we arrived around 11:40ish, the place was half full already but we were seated right away.
To be honest, I am not a seafood fan, but having a husband and two daughters who love shrimp and crab, I eventually learnt to like it too. The reason why I was also determined to try The Captain’s Boil is because of the idea that it is similar to The Boiling Crab (in California, USA), when I heard about this seafood place and learned how great the food were and you get to eat with your hands, I find it really appealing, just like how “buddle fight” (a Filipino way of eating that dispenses with cutlery and dishes and food is placed on top of a long banana leaf) is appealing to me.
We were provided with the menu which I find to be very short and simple, I love how it has lots of photos so it’ll be easier for the guests to see what they are ordering. While looking at the menu, the server came to us and explained how the menu worked. The restaurant takes on a popular Cajun seafood boil format and is one of Winnipeg’s first. The main feature of their meu is seafood of course including lobster, crawfish, Dungeness crab, snow crab legs, king crab legs, shrimp, clams, mussels and for non-seafood fan like my son, they have chicken slices. Price range starts from $10.95 to $35 per pound (depending on the type of seafood that you are ordering.)
To order, you will simply follow 3 simple steps:
First, you will choose your seafood.
Second, you’ll choose the flavor that you’ll like to go with your seafood. There’s four choices that you can choose from – Cajun, lemon pepper, garlic sauce and the Captain’s Boil which is a combination of the other three sauces.
Third, you will choose your heat (or level of spiciness) – they have non-spicy, mild, medium and fire (smoking’ hot).
I have been looking around the web about this restaurant even before it opened it’s first branch in Winnipeg and I found out that the restaurant takes on a popular Cajun seafood boil format, the seafood is not cooked sous-vide, but were boiled first and then put into the bags and mixed with the seasoning before serving.
My husband wanted to try the lobster but as what the menu suggested crawfish and lobster are seasonal, they don’t have it. So, we opted for shrimps and mussels and went for the captain’s boil flavour. We also ordered fresh oyster platter, Cajun seafood fried rice and fried shrimp basket for my two girls. Since my son is not a seafood fan, he went for the chicken teriyaki sizzling plate combo, that comes with teriyaki rice, chicken slices with seafood assortment.
While waiting for our order, we were provided with disposable bib (for our clothes protection) and plastic gloves (to keep our hands clean) plus a dispenser full of napkin. It was not a long wait, our food started to arrive in our table within about 10 minutes. The food came in plastic bags.
As soon as my husband opened the bag of shrimp, you could smell the aroma of the seasoning, my husband and I both find the shrimp delicious, they were cooked just right! The captain’s boil sauce was so good, to get the full experience, I would peel my shrimp and dunk it to the after peeling. We went for mild spicy since my kids want to try it too and mild heat is just right for me.
Though, the captain’s boil is now my instant favorite, I also loved the mussels in garlic sauce. I love garlic with any food, so even my husband was saying the garlic flavour in our mussels were so strong, so I have no complaints about this. Just like the shrimp, I find the mussels cooked just right.
Overall, our dining experience was great. From service, to the food to the place, I was satisfied. Our server who looked after us pretty well, he ensured that we enjoyed our experience. Yes, the food came in a plastic bag, but you don’t expect beautifully plated meals from places like this, right? I guess most seafood restaurants serve their dishes this way, since your table will get messy really fast. Besides the use of your hands instead of utensils is what the experience is all about. If there’s any tip that I can share with first-time customers like us, get water instead of any other drink, you will need it to balance out the strong flavours and stick to 1 pound of seafood per person.
My Rating: Pretty Good. We would definitely come back to this place.
Location: 2081 Pembina Hwy, Winnipeg, MB R3T 5J9
