A tour of the best restaurants to enjoy in Nishitachi, the largest entertainment district in Miyazaki

Local charcoal-grilled chicken is one of the leading gourmet options in Miyazaki. The locally grown chicken is flavored with salt and pepper before quickly grilling it over high temperature charcoal. The result features a delicious savory aroma and tender texture. The chicken goes great with local Miyazaki shochu, and can be found at specialty restaurants and Izakaya bars.

There are numerous restaurants in Nishitachi that serve delicious Gyoza dumplings. Freshly fried dumplings, with their crispy outer skins, go perfectly with beer, so make sure you try them together. 

Miyazaki Prefecture is home to an abundant variety of shochu, so raise your first cup of the evening with shochu accompanied by some light snacks. Many locals like to visit the Nishitachi standing bars, so they’re a great place to gather information on the area as well.

We recommend trying yakiniku made with Miyazaki’s own brand of beef that has won the Prime Minister’s Award four times consecutively at the National Wagyu (Japanese beef) Promotion Competition, also known as the Wagyu Olympics. Miyazaki beef is known for its soft texture and mouthwatering flavor. We recommend trying and comparing the many different parts of the cow, such as the most popular short rib (Karubi) and loin (Rosu), along with some of the less common bits.

A sushi restaurant is the best place to experience the fresh seasonal taste of Miyazaki. Some restaurants offer complete courses decided by the chef, known as “omakase”, while others let you order as little as one piece of sushi. These restaurants generally also let you enjoy other seafood such as sashimi, grilled dishes, and simmered dishes.

Do you want to eat fish and meat and vegetables together? The best thing about the so-called Izakaya style bars in Japan is that you can try a variety of local foods there, such as local charcoal-grilled chicken, Chicken Nanban, and Hiya-jiru chilled soup. If you can, try and find an izakaya that is frequented by the locals!

We recommend that you try a serving of Miyazaki’s local Karamen! You’ll be able to choose how spicy you want your Karamen, or literally “spicy noodles”, just in case spicy hot isn’t for you, and in addition to the standard healthy konjac noodles, you can also choose udon and ramen noodles as well. The soup, flavored with lots of garlic chives, egg, minced meat, and garlic, is very addictive. It is so good that many diners add rice to it to finish off every last drop when they’ve eaten all the noodles.

Kamaage udon is one of the standard ways the citizens of Miyazaki finish off an evening of drinking. Freshly boiled and slightly soft noodles are eaten by dipping them into a soy sauce based dipping sauce flavored with the Yuzu citrus fruit, rather than as a noodle soup. The noodles seem to slide right down your throat with their texture similar to mochi rice-cake, and they’re an easy dish to eat after drinking, so you’ll finish them before you know it. When you’re finished, you can also pour the remaining liquid left over from the boiled noodles into the dipping sauce to thin it, and drink that.

There are specialty fruit shops that remain open late at night in Nishitachi, and there are those who like to close out their night with a fruit parfait. So why not close out your own night with a parfait filled with the many delicious fruits representative of tropical Miyazaki? There are also bars offering cocktails made with ample fruit as well, which make a perfect choice for your last stop!