Tucked away in San Pedro de Alcantara, Umi is serving up some of the most exciting Japanese food on the Costa del Sol – and it deserves to be on your radar.
San Pedro doesn’t always get the culinary glory of its glitzier neighbours, but Umi is quietly making a case for it.
We started light, with a wakame salad that was fresh and flavourful, alongside steaming edamame beans.
The star came in the sashimi, elevated with a passion fruit sauce that lands beautifully; the sweetness cutting through the fish in a way that is both unexpected and completely right.
Another standout was the volcano tempura prawn. Crisp, impossibly tender, and served with a spicy sauce, it’s the dish you’ll be thinking about on the drive home. We could have eaten it by the bucketful.
Umi’s nigiri is equally impressive. A tuna piece finished with lime and passion fruit was one of the finest bites of nigiri we’ve had.
If you’re tempted to skip the street food section of the menu, don’t. The wagyu taco and beef brioche are an absolute must-order – rich, moorish, and gone far too quickly.
On the drinks front, the sake list is short but serious, and so is the staff’s knowledge of it. They’ll guide you through the options with genuine enthusiasm.
For dessert, we went with the mochi and yuzu ice cream. The yuzu carries a lovely mandarin quality – fragrant, a little sharp, deeply satisfying. The perfect full stop to a meal that had delivered at every turn.
Umi isn’t shouting about itself, which is perhaps why it’s still something of a local secret. But with food this good, that won’t last long.
