Café Natural Life in Hioki City, Kagoshima, offers wild game dishes
The exterior of Natural Life
Three months have passed since the café Natural Life (ナチュローらいふ) opened in Hiyoshicho, Hioki City, serving hamburgers and other dishes featuring wild game meat.
Masaru Motoyama, the owner, is a member of a hunting association and started marketing game meat out of his desire to “show respect for the life of animals taken by hunting.” Motoyama’s company, Sankai Farm, distributes game meat to Tokyo and beyond. On July 1, he decided to open the café to “let more people in Kagoshima know about the goodness of game meat.”
The café, housed in a renovated building once a Landslide Museum, has a counter with eight seats around a central column, a regular counter with four seats, and two tables for two to four people. It has a section selling plants and promoting hand-woven baskets and other handmade items made by local artists. Motoyama created chalk drawings on the walls.
The burgers offered include Game Burger (600 yen), Beef Burger (500 yen), and Game Burger with Teriyaki Sauce (700 yen). Examples of lunch menus are Wild Boar Hamburger Steak & Venison Curry Set (1,000 yen) and Hamburg Plate (1,200 yen), featuring a game hamburger steak, pasta, and fried chicken. The café also offers four types of pasta, including crab cream pasta and Neapolitan pasta.
Motoyama says, “We use different cooking methods depending on the type of meat to reduce the smell and make the meat tastier.” Motoyama also sells game meat at the Hioki City Specialty Market (until December 29) and hopes to make it more readily available in Kagoshima Prefecture.
Opening hours: 11:00 a.m. – 3:00 p.m. Closed on Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays.