Southwest Miyazaki · MiyakonojoNo.996★★★Open in map →
Miyazaki Charcoal-Grilled Jidori Chicken
Miyazaki grills its chicken over charcoal until the smoke blackens the skin, and the bird behind it answers to a written standard. A roadside station on Route 10, built around meat and shochu, puts the chain on one floor.
- FromMiyakonojo Station (JR Nippo Main Line)
- ~10 minBus or taxi from the station
- Miyazaki Charcoal-Grilled Jidori Chicken
Where it is
18 more notes in Miyazaki · open the map →What to look for — in walking order
- The timber canopythe lattice-beamed roof over the forecourt, with the lawn and open-air tables beneath it
- The information cornerthe desk inside the entrance, with maps of the basin and the Kirishima side
- The produce hallvegetables and fruit brought in by growers from around the city
- Nikuru no Nikuya, the butcherthe meat counter, with prefecture-raised beef, pork and chicken shelved together
- The shochu cornerbottles from four of the city's distilleries, set beside the meat rather than apart from it
How to actually get there
- Miyakonojo Station → the roadside station on Route 10, by bus or taxi.
- In under the timber canopy, then the information corner.
- Produce hall first, then the butcher, then the shochu.
- Finish at the cafes, or out across the lawn to the car park.
- From Miyakonojo Station
- Miyakonojo sits on the JR Nippo Main Line and is where the Yoshitsu Line ends, so most approaches to this corner of the prefecture pass through it. The roadside station is about four kilometres north of the platforms, out where the town meets Route 10. Buses along the trunk road set down at the site, and taxis wait outside the ticket gates.
- Back to Miyakonojo Station
- Retrace the road south along Route 10. Trains from Miyakonojo run north towards Miyazaki and south towards Kagoshima into the evening, but the roadside station shuts first. The closing time that matters here is the shop's, not the railway's.
About the place
Jidori is fixed by national standard, and the prefecture's own brand goes further than the standard asks. The national rule caps stocking at ten birds per square metre. Miyazaki Jitokko allows no more than two, and the birds stay on the floor for the whole of their lives rather than in cages. Miyakonojo is where that kind of farming concentrates — the city ranks first among all municipalities in Japan for farm output, and livestock accounts for the bulk of it. The cooking is blunt by comparison. Thigh meat goes over lit charcoal, the fat drips into the coals, and the smoke that comes back up does most of the work.
How to enjoy it
Come in daylight: the shop and the kitchen both close well before the trains stop, and the point of this stop is reading labels rather than eating in the dark. Take the produce hall before the butcher, so anything chilled spends the least time in the car. Driving the run between Miyazaki and Kagoshima, this falls at about the natural break.
Background & history
The bird came before the brand. Jitokko were kept in the Kirishima foothills long before anyone thought to market them, and the name is traced to the jito, the estate steward the birds were held to be good enough to send to. Numbers fell so low that the stock was designated a natural monument in 1943. The prefectural livestock research station began breeding work from it in 1985, crossing the native bird into something a farm could raise at scale, and the name now printed on labels was settled in 2004. It is held today as a registered regional collective trademark, so the words on the packet answer to somebody.
Before you go
- Cash
- There is no admission — this is a shop and a kitchen, so you pay only for what you take. Carry cash as well as a card, and ask before assuming a foreign card will clear.
- Before you go
- Opening is daytime only, and published hours differ between listings, so check the current times before setting out rather than turning up on a hunch. Weekends fill the car park and the lawn.
- Another way
- By car it is simpler. The site fronts Route 10 between Miyazaki and Kagoshima and has its own car park, and the Miyazaki Expressway runs parallel a short way west, so it works as a break whether you are on the trunk road or coming off the interchange.
- After you get off
- From Miyakonojo Station this is too far to walk — take a bus north along Route 10, or a taxi. Buses set down at the site itself. The building sits back behind a wide paved forecourt and a lawn, under a broad timber canopy, and the sign at the entrance is marked for the Miyazaki and Kagoshima directions.