Shiroebi-tei

Little knownBarely documented in English. This is the kind of place the site exists for.

Researched and written by Hinato

shiroebiwhite shrimpToyama StationToyama Baytendon

Toyama · Toyama City

36.7012°N, 137.2121°E

Toyama's food culture rewards showing up hungry and unhurried — Shiroebi-tei is built for exactly that.

Shiroebi are tiny translucent shrimp, three or four centimetres long, that live in the deep trench running through Toyama Bay. They are caught commercially in effectively one place on earth — this bay — which is why almost nobody outside the prefecture has eaten them fresh. Raw, they are faintly sweet and dissolve rather than resist; fried, they go crisp with almost no flesh to speak of.

The catch is the problem: each shrimp has to be peeled by hand, and a bowl of sashimi represents a great deal of somebody's afternoon. Shiroebi-tei is in the market complex inside Toyama Station and does two things — a tendon of fried shrimp for ¥1,690 and a bowl of hand-peeled raw shrimp for ¥3,600 — which makes it the most efficient way for a traveller to eat the one thing Toyama Bay has that nowhere else does, without leaving the station.

Eating essentials

Price range

Ganso shiroebi tendon ¥1,690 | Shiroebi sashimi bowl ¥3,600

Best season

April–November for the shiroebi season | Year-round on the menu

Hours

11:00 AM – 8:00 PM | A midday break is taken on some weekdays

Closed: Confirm before travelling

How long to allow

30–45 minutes

How to reach it

Access notes

Toyama, inside the Kitokito Ichiba Toyamaru-che market on the ground floor of JR Toyama Station. Ganso shiroebi tendon ¥1,690; shiroebi sashimi bowl ¥3,600. Rice is Toyama-grown koshihikari.

Insider tips

**The sashimi bowl is the one to travel for.** ¥3,600 is a lot for a bowl of rice and shrimp and it is the version that is genuinely unavailable elsewhere. Each shrimp on it was peeled by hand. **The tendon is the sensible order.** At ¥1,690 the fried version shows what the shrimp does with heat and costs less than half. If you are ordering one thing and are not certain, order this. **It is inside the station.** No detour, no reservation, and it works between a Shinkansen arrival and a local departure. That is the whole argument for eating here rather than at a specialist restaurant in the city. **Weekday midday breaks happen.** Phone if you have a train to catch. **Spring for the season.** Shiroebi fishing runs from around April to November, and the shrimp are at their best early in that window.