Jigoku Mushi - Beppu

Better than expected! Meat is surprisingly tasty and fresh, it’s definitely the same steam meat/vege you do at home. Worth trying when you are there. There is a lot of optional on the menu, we tried the mix vege and meat , with eggs. You will “cook”yourself, staff will guide you through, fun experience !

There was a long line but we took the number first and strolled around so when we came back we could just enter right away. You can buy the food from the vending machine and you will be able to put it inside the steam. Once you wait for 15 minutes, you can take it out and start eating. Pretty cool experience.

Get a number from the counter first before getting your meal ticket from the machine. There will be a wait before your number is called, and you can hand them your number tag and meal ticket. After you hand it to them, they will start getting your food ingredients ready and give you steam box number, timer, etc. head to the steam room, and there will be someone there to help you. You just put the food in, when the timer goes off, take it out, that's all. The food is fresh but tasteless, and there is no other seasoning but soy sauce on the table. Bring your own seasoning if you can't it bland food. Otherwise, it's a cool experience.

Tourist trap. We ordered the seafood set meal and meat set meal. Each was 1700yen. It was WAY overpriced for what was given. I thought we were paying for the experience, but at the cashier, the staff shoved a calculator and a laminated piece of paper in our faces, telling us to cough up another 200yen each. She didn’t even bother to explain properly until I questioned her. Apparently, there’s a price to use their steamers, 200yen per person! It was ridiculous. The overpriced cost of 1700yen should more than enough cover the “steaming”. Worse, the food items. Basically the shop gives an experience of putting food into a traditional steamer. But that’s it. All the food items are steamed for 15 mins. This meant the meat and seafood were both way overcooked, the hard vegetables like potatoes were not cooked enough. Sweet potatoes, pumpkin, carrot, corn etc were all not sweet. Bland and tasteless. The baby cabbage tasted spoilt. The rice was nondescript too. It was way too mushy and bland. Overall, without the bottle of black sauce, one would find it hard to stomach the food. Conclusion: highly not recommended unless you just want to try the whole “tourist checkpoint” experience here.

You got to come here at 10 am and I still had to wait 20 minutes!! But the it got even more crowded with much longer waiting time and hunting for tables! So better get here as early as possible. It is relatively expensive but fun, they let you place the food platter in the steamer by yourself and also pick it up (under staff's supervision) and they are soooo cute the old and young ladies in the kitchen and ready to help and film you while you are cooking it! Definitely coming here every time when visiting Beppu. The steam is slightly salty and it will give a good flavor to the pork meat!! Didn't apply any sauces to it because it was just delicious with salt. You can and should bring your own BEER because they don't sell drinks and there are vending machines for juice and tea, coffee. Also before you come here definitely go the the best hot spring in Beppu, the Mushi Yu with steam sauna over a bed of real herbs! There too go as early to beat the crowds!