Ishioka city! The first place I lived in when I first moved to Japan. Ishioka is famous for its huge festival in the long weekend of September and all the fruit that is grown around the Yasato area. But did you know that Ishioka has an ostrich farm?
That's a lot of Ostriches.
This place has a lot of ostriches, and I mean a lot. From the parking lot to the entrance of the farm, it is ostriches as far as you can see. You can actually feed the ostriches if you want to. You can buy a bag of ostrich treats which look like round rice krispies at a vending machine for 200 yen. If you are worried about what the ostriches might do to your hand, then I suggest throwing the treats at them. They will just eat them off the ground. Or, if you are a daredevil like me, you can put some treats on your hand and pray that the ostrich will be gentle.
Not gentle at all!
This guy was not gentle at all. He went for my hand like if his life depended on it. I think at one point he almost took my wedding ring with him. It hurt. Ostriches do not have teeth but their beaks are like sharp hammers. The black feathered ostriches were more gentle and picked the treats from my hands like a graceful Victorian era ostrich, except for the black feathered ostrich in the picture. I found out that the ostriches with black feathers are males and grey feathered ostriches are females. The females were pretty rough when I fed them and my hand was pretty sore afterwards. Then I saw a sign saying "we have gloves if you want to feed the ostriches." Ostriches 1, dumb foreigner 0.
The Ostrich Farm Store
After checking out the ostriches, you can head into the store near the main entrance. The store has a lot of stuffed animal ostriches, books about them and about other animals. But what surprised me was what food they sold.
Ostrich Meat
The freezer is filled with ostrich meat. You can buy the thigh of an ostrich, or ostrich neck on a stick, and a lot more parts of the ostrich to cook how you like. I was amazed by how much you can eat of an ostrich. I really didn't end up buying any of the meat because I have no idea how to prepare and cook an ostrich. But I think I might buy some next time and give cooking ostrich meat a go.
Ostrich Egg
They also sell ostrich eggs at the store. As you can see from the picture which compares a chicken egg to an ostrich egg, an ostrich egg is huge. I was really interested in buying one until I saw the price. I was curious but I wasn't 4000 yen curious.
Ostrich Curry
They even had ostrich curry in the store which I kick myself for not buying. Next time, I will buy and try the ostrich curry.
The store also has a kitchen in the back which prepares an assortment of ostrich dishes. That day. the wife and I decided to try the ostrich on a stick and the ostrich burger. The staff let me know it will take a few minutes to make and that we can eat it outside. The farm has an outside eating area with a few picnic tables which is really nice near the store. They also have a BBQ area where you and your family can sit down and grill up some meat. I am assuming the BBQ is not only ostrich meat. We weren't able to try the BBQ area because it was closed when we went. It is in a huge tent and it looks nice for a family outing. The wife and I got our food, sat outside on one of the picnic tables and tried our ostrich.
Ostrich on a stick!
The ostrich on a stick was...interesting. It doesn't taste like chicken at all. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't bad but it is not my favorite menu item at the farm. The meat was really good but it was a little bit tough and dry. To be honest, I would rather have yakitori over ostrich on a stick any day of the week. But it was a good experience.
Ostrich Burger!
Next we come to the ostrich burger which comes with mayonnaise, onions, lettuce and of course ostrich meat. I wasn't sure how I was going to feel about this burger but after one bite I ended up really enjoying it. The meat was very flavorful and it wasn't dry like the ostrich on a stick. The patty went perfectly well with the onions and the mayonnaise. The buns were OK, nothing to write home about. But overall, I did really enjoy this ostrich burger. It was delicious and the wife agreed. I wanted one more burger but I was reminded that we were on a schedule and had to get to the other farm area.
Hey Alpaca!
The Ostrich Farm has another zoo area with different animals all roaming around for everyone to see and touch. The Ostrich Farm is free to enter but entrance to this zoo is 1000 yen per person, I think it is cheaper for kids. You can also buy a bucket of vegetables to feed the animals which was 700 yen. So we bought our tickets, walked inside and were greeted by an alpaca which was very interested in the contents of our bucket. We, of course, gave it some cabbage, petted it and moved on.
The zoo area isn't as huge as Ueno Zoo or anything like that but it is pretty neat. I think the place is really nice for kids. There are a lot of alpacas roaming around the open ground area and there is a playground area for kids in the middle. I saw a lot of animals in the zoo. Goats, sheep, horses, turkeys, kangaroos, dogs, cats, and even a donkey.
My wife really wanted to show me the capybara area and I had no idea what a capybara was.
Capybara
This is a capybara, and it is super friendly and lazy. They just sit around all day in water like they are at an onsen and eat. This guy was super happy that we gave him some carrots. There were about 7 capybaras when we went and they were all just having a lazy Sunday. We fed them, petted them and then we heard that familiar tune that everyone hears in Japan. In America, this tune is used to ring in the New Year. In Japan, it means closing time.
The wife and I had a really good time at the Ostrich Farm and zoo. It was cool seeing and playing with all the animals. I hope I can go back again some time. As I said before, I think this place is really good for a family outing. Your kids will love it. The farm also takes a lot of precautions for the corona virus. There are some places to wash your hands, there are alcohol spray stations and even floor mats with alcohol on them. Everything is also 99 percent outside which is great during these times.
So if you want to have a fun time with your family and give ostrich meat a try, come on down to Ishioka's Ostrich Farm. Who knows, you might see me there, enjoying my ostrich burger and thinking of this will be the day that I buy that huge expensive ostrich egg.
Enjoy!
For more information on Ishioka's Ostrich Farm, check out their website. Sorry non-Japanese speakers, no English on the website;
Yes, the one in Hitachi-naka is El Paso. Basically we went there last month on a day when it should have been open and it wasn't. I couldn't tell for sure, but got the impression it wasn't going to open again any time soon, either.
I didn't realise you reviewed Mosh & Tacos (I did a search of your blog for 'Mexican' but not 'tacos'), so thanks for the recommendation, and for the heads-up about El Torito — anything that's going to save me money is useful to know!
Sorry hamburg Is the Hitachi Naka place Erupan エルパン？ That place is OK.
Hey Tom, as far as Mexican food goes, El Torito isn't bad at all. I recommend going during lunch time because dinner prices are a little steep. MOSH & TACOS in Toride is really good. It is a really small place but awesome tacos. I wrote about it on Ibaraki Eats if you want to know more. There is also a tacos place in Ishioka but I haven't tried it yet. I have heard it is OK. The Hitachi Naka place,is it the gamburg and tacos place?
We really like the ostrich farm as it's a bit less stressful than a big zoo, but there are still plenty of interesting animals for our kids to see/hold/feed/get bitten by etc. We also tried the ostrich meat - a bit expensive, but I thought it was very nice (then again, I'm usually a veggie, so not a very good judge of these things!). Anyway, I have a question for you: we'd like to get some Mexican food, so is there anywhere that you'd recommend? A friend of ours suggested El Torito in Tsukuba, which we're planning on going to at some point, but if there's anywhere else you know of, I'd be interested to hear about it. (There used…