The genuine love of seafood is evident at this large fishmonger with a dining room and sushi bar attached. Tanks full of live lobsters cover one wall, while live Queensland mud crabs cool their claws in buckets, awaiting the chop. The central fish butchery displays prawns, barramundi, snapper, swordfish, squid, oysters, fillets of salmon and much more; it's like the cast of The Little Mermaid in here.
The Fish Factory supplies to top Brisbane restaurants including Rick Shores, Otto and the Howard Smith Wharves group. It's said to be the oldest continually running seafood market in town, dating back to the '70s, and it gets hectic here around Christmas and special events such as prawn shelling competitions.
The kitchen up the back does a roaring trade in some of the freshest fish and chips you'll find. There are daily specials; you can find a superb piece of grilled snapper for $15, while mullet, cod or flake is only $9 and chips start at $5.50. Our piece of salmon was cooked a precise medium rare, pink and meltingly soft; the skin on top was crisped to perfection and the seasoning was spot on. Beer battered chips are crunchy and moreish. All are served in biodegradable packaging.
Feeling flash? A bucket of cooked prawns is $30; a mixed grill for around the same price will net you some Moreton Bay bug, salt and pepper calamari, scallops, prawns and chips with nanjim sauce. The sushi bar, meanwhile, is well above the average in freshness, quality and price, and worth every cent. Sushi chef Ishi trained at the Sushi Academy in Tokyo, and those maki don't just come as cooked tuna but raw tuna, Moreton Bay bug or kingfish – blimey.
If eating in or ordering takeaway, just be aware that this place can be super popular at night times (lunch is less crowded). But if you're a true lover of what the ocean provides, you'll probably be happy to wait.
