Oi Izakaya Japanese Restaurant Burleigh Heads Gold Coast

Burleigh Heads on the Gold Coast has so many great restaurants, making this beach side location one of the best dining precincts on the Gold Coast. Even if you are staying in Surfers Paradise or Broadbeach, it is well worth the short trip down to Burleigh Heads for a huge selection of great restaurants. Add to that list Oi Izakaya, tucked away in one of the back streets of Burleigh. Even though it is not located on the main road, it sure is a popular restaurant and for good reason.

‘Oi’ in Japanese is a casual way to get attention, an ‘Izakaya’ is like a Japanese pub, with loads of food which is designed for sharing. So grab a beer, grab a cocktail, order some plates of food, then repeat. More drinks, more food! A great dining experience for the best grazing experience.

Oi Izakaya has a great menu with so many of the most popular Japanese dishes that you would find in the many izakayas on the streets of Tokyo or Osaka. With simple, Japanese style decor, Oi Izakaya has dining inside or out the front of the restaurant. Being within a small shopping arcade, the outdoor dining area is still undercover so protected from the weather.

3 of us went in for dinner and were all ready to order after checking out their menu on the website (see link below). Rather than ordering everything at the same time, we had the game plan of extending our stay and getting a few cold bevvies down along with our favourite dishes.

First dish we ordered was the delicious karaage chicken ($16.50), which is deep fried, usually with a flour batter but at Oi Izakaya their karaage chicken is gluten free which suited one us at the table.

Next up was one of our all time favourites, the pork belly ($21). The crispy pork kakuni is 48 hour slow cooked soy braised pork-belly with a honey soy glaze and served with a herb salad. Any time there is pork belly on the menu, we will be ordering it.

On the menu was the soft shell crab ($23) which is also another favourite of ours. When we went to order this dish, they said that night they were only serving the soft shell crab in their black bao buns. This is a bit unusual as the ‘bao buns’ usually come from Vietnam or from China and not so much from Japan. We ordered this dish but just peeled back the bao buns and got stuck into the delicious soft shell crab. The black buns did not look that appetizing so they really should reconsider serving up delicious soft shell crab with these unappealing black buns.

For our final plate, we ordered the okonomiyaki, a dish I have enjoyed in Osaka and Hiroshima. This Japanese style pancake/omelette is a signature dish at Oi Izakaya. The dish consists of green cabbage, free range organic egg, rice flour, bonito flakes, mayo, special okonomiyaki sauce and can be served with veges ($19), pork ($19), beef ($19) or seafood ($21). We went for the seafood and ordered ours gluten free to suit the Celiac at the table. Well the non-celiacs were not so impressed with the gluten free okonomiyaki.

With a few drinks each, the bill came to around $60 per person which is a pretty good deal with dining out these days. I can highly recommend a feed at Oi Izakaya. We will definitely be back soon.