Shimada Suisan - Oyster farm + dining by the sea in Miyajimaguchi!

Shimada Suisan 島田水産

One of our wishlists for a long time was to try out an oyster buffet at an oyster farm, which is by the sea too (saying the obvious). Plus it was a fun experience for both of us and a yummy one too at Shimada Suisan!

Don’t worry too much of the location, as it is about 10 minutes walk from Miyajimaguchi JR Station only. If are already going on a leisure day trip to Miyajima, it’s just a slight detour. But if you are going to do some hiking or need the entire day at Miyajima, maybe you can come over for the late afternoon session.

**Shucked open an oyster**
Shimada Suisan 島田水産

Oyster Buffet (¥2980 per adult + ¥550 charcoal fee per table)

All you can cook and eat for 70 minutes (60 minutes on weekends)

Before going over to the tables by the sea or in a hut (beside the entrance), you will need to pickup your gloves, tongs, and utensils.

After ordering for 2 pax buffet, you can go collect the basket of fresh oysters at a collection area, as we chose to sit by the sea, it is at a corner near the entrance of that area.

The buffet also comes with a bowl of Oyster Rice, which you need to go collect yourself when they called out your table number. As we don’t understand Japanese, our kind neighbours from the table beside told us that our number has been called over the PA and should go collect it. Thanks to them again!

DIY Oyster Grilling

The star of this place of course and obviously is the fresh oysters, and the experience of grilling it.

As this is our first time doing this, we thought that the oyster must “pop open” by itself then count that it’s cooked. Our first batch half of it does, the other half doesn’t, but it has cooked more than 8 minutes. Then we knew we need to still manually shuck open those who already cooked but not automatically “pop open”.

By the way, yes, you can overcooked it aka burnt aka chao ta. In our first batch, a couple of it are on the verge of that already.

So with our newly gained experience of oyster grilling from the first batch, second batch onwards are much more smoothly, and knowing roughly how many minutes are just nice for us. Although manually shucking the oysters get tiring after a while haha!

Another exciting point to make, you will need to be prepared by the loud “POP!” sound every so often, and hope no oyster juice hits you (can’t control and depends on luck), but then you are going to be surrounded by many tables of people grilling oysters including yourself so... Next point is the charcoal ashes, that I’m sure no luck or no way you can avoid being sort of covered in that in someway or the other haha!

Now for to the actual review!

Oyster: Pretty “briny”, tender, plump (to a certain extent), and of course very fresh oysters.

Size: On average I will say most around medium size, but of course there are some that are below average and some are above average size from our data point of 4 baskets of oysters which are approximately 80-90 oysters we ate in total.

For reference the photo above of a shucked oyster is of below average size, I didn’t take much photos after the initial eating, cause hands are dirty already.

None are of the large or XL size you might see in specialised oyster restaurants outside, but those are selling at ala carte basis and at a much higher price, anywhere from at least ¥500-800 per piece even at those wholesale wet markets.

Overall: The experience of grilling oysters yourself and bonding with your partner/friends/family is fun! And if you guys cook while you talk and eat (proper time management), the value of this buffet is a plus point too! We ate on average 40 oysters per pax even on a normal pace for a first visit, which is about ¥80+ per oyster!

I believe you guys who are of younger gens or competitive eaters can eat at a much faster pace (for those group that want to extract max value) than us Uncle and Auntie Shiro 😂😂. To us, we just want to enjoy and eat at a normal pace.

But be very mentally and physically prepared (ie. don’t wear your ATAS clothing that day if you are going to be bothered by it) that you will be covered with charcoal ashes everywhere and might be spilled with some oyster juice (no one can control this).

The missus already wanting to make another trip down to Shimada Suisan again if we even visit Hiroshima in future. This time round we will bring our own condiments like Tabasco sauce and more lemon!

Rating: 3.75/5

**Ala carte price list**
Shimada Suisan 島田水産

**Road side signboard**
Shimada Suisan 島田水産

**Entrance of the restaurant**
Shimada Suisan 島田水産

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Address: 広島県廿日市市宮島口西1-2-6

Opening Hours: 10am-4pm (Weekdays), 10am-7pm (Saturday), 10am-5pm (Sunday)

Payment Method: Cash

Website: https://shimadasuisan.com/

Tabelog: https://tabelog.com/en/hiroshima/A3402/A340205/34014259/

(Last visited: November 2024)