Visit Wakayama

This unpretentious diner sits right at the entrance to the ferry pier for Tomogashima, serving up meals made with sea bream and locally harvested seaweed products, including wakame, hijiki, and kanten agar. If you have time to spare, order one of the set meals. The sashimi set, which comes with simmered fish collar, is a great option. Also look out for the Kada-zukushi set, an occasional special featuring sea bream over rice and made entirely with ingredients from Kada. If it’s on the menu that day, you should consider ordering it. Weekends and peak season bring a steady stream of ferry passengers all day long. If your boat is leaving quite soon, try the seafood rice bowl—it arrives fast!

● Kada Ebisuya

211 Kada, Wakayama City

Parking: Available

A short walk from the Wakayama Prefectural Cultural Hall, Washoku Yossan has a bright, tidy interior, with counter seats and low tables set over a recessed floor well so you can sit with your legs down. Fish comes from local fishing ports and the vegetables are picked fresh. The pick of the menu is the Yokubari, or “have it all,” set, a generous spread of sashimi, tempura, three small side dishes, and a salad, beautifully arranged on carefully chosen tableware. There are 11 lunch options in all. The mini-kaiseki, a shortened version of the traditional Japanese multi-course meal, and the omakase chef’s choice course both need to be pre-ordered ahead of time.

● Washoku Yossan

Dai-ichi Tanaka Building 1F, 20 Hiromichi, Wakayama City, Wakayama Prefecture

About five minutes on foot from the east exit of JR Wakayama Station, Mihanami has counter seats, tables, and sunken seating where you can stretch your legs out. Fresh seafood sourced straight from local fishing ports is the pride of the kitchen. Wakayama's regional dishes are the specialty here, made with carefully chosen ingredients, presented on beautiful tableware, and served with real warmth. Among the many lunch courses, Aozora (“blue sky”) features eight items: salad, three appetizers, sashimi, a hot pot for one, tempura, rice, dessert, and a drink.

● Mihanami

2-1-25 Kuroda, Wakayama City, Wakayama Prefecture

The restaurant is three minutes’ walk from the central exit of JR Wakayama Station. The kitchen picks seasonal fish from the local fishing ports and from around Japan. There is a second Sakana Ryori Rokkon branch in Osaka’s Kita-Shinchi district and the name is a favorite with office workers. The Wakayama restaurant is a calm, relaxing place, with a tatami room rebuilt from a machiya, a traditional wooden townhouse, that stood here 150 years ago. At lunch, the ""Otsukuri Gozen"" sashimi set is good value, offering sashimi, tempura, a small side dish, miso soup, pickles, and Koshihikari rice from Niigata. Come in the evening for the sea bream rice course or the omakase mini (“mini chef’s choice”) course.

● Sakana Ryori Rokkon, Wakayama

4-87 Misonocho, Wakayama City, Wakayama Prefecture

Close to Wakaura fishing port, this restaurant is housed in a renovated former inn built some 90 years ago. The nostalgic interior looks out over Wakaura Bay, and you can enjoy the beautiful view over a meal or just coffee and cake. Dishes built around locally caught fish are the draw, and the Waka-Shoku bowl is the best loved of them for its lavish spread and its sheer size: sea bream, shrimp, whitebait, and other seafood piled high over rice and dressed with the restaurant’s own special sauce. Concerts and other events are also held here from time to time.

● Wakaura Shokudou

4-16 Shin-Wakaura, Wakayama City, Wakayama Prefecture

Parking: Use the paid public parking lot inside Wakaura fishing port (free for diners)