Sushi Yanagiya

If Sushi En is the pilgrimage, Sushi Yanagiya (鮨 やなぎ屋) is the counter you can actually book — and that practicality is its quiet strength. At ¥25,300 it lands in the dead center of the satisfaction zone, the price band where the meal feels generous rather than punishing, and its seven-to-eight-seat room is the small box this framework prizes. The chef relocated here from a well-loved counter in Kojima (児島), the bridge-town facing Shikoku, bringing a reputation for a calm, unhurried temperament to a new room near Okayama Station.

The sourcing thesis is chi-no-ri (地の利) practiced daily: every morning the chef walks the market himself, choosing Setouchi (瀬戸内) local fish by eye rather than by standing order. That catch is dressed over Okayama Asahi (岡山あさひ) rice bound with aka-zu (赤酢), the amber red-vinegar shari that lends a deeper, slightly nutty backbone to the nigiri — a choice that reads as conviction, not fashion.

Expect an omakase-only progression with a medium-to-high nigiri balance, the small plates and the hand-pressed sushi trading off across the meal. The room runs two seatings — an early turn from 17:30 and a later one from 20:00 — which bothers some purists; if it bothers you, the single-seating counters elsewhere in the city are the answer.

The honest caveat is youth. The relocation is recent, and the review record is still thin — a handful of Tabelog entries that reflect a short tenure rather than any shortfall of skill. Booking is phone only (reception 12:00–16:00), photography policy is unstated, so confirm both at the time you reserve. As with all our Okayama listings, Yanagiya is not yet visited by us and curated from its public record; we flag the thin sample plainly rather than paper over it.