Nomura Soba in Shirakawago

We stopped by the lovely village Shirakawago in Gifu, famous for its thatched roof homes. This restaurant, Nomura soba, came recommended by a local. The noodles are made fresh each day.

Zaru Soba

Zarusoba is a cold type soba dish.

It is similar to Mori Soba.

Zaru soba is topped with shreded Nori.
Mori soba is topped with nothing.
Both of soba noodle and dipping sauce are same in Zaru soba and Mori soba.

In my case, I prefer Zarusoba.
Because I think Nori is good for soba.


(Note)
Usually Zaru soba is served on rounded plate, Mori soba is served on squarish plate.

Long ago, Dipping sauces were different in Zaru soba and Mori soba.

Tsukimi Soba

"Tsukimi" means moon viewing.
This is a kind of hot type soba dish.
Soba noodles are in hot soup and topped on a raw egg and Nori.
Raw egg is showed as full moon, and Nori is showed as clouds
It looks lovely but aloso delicious.
Because raw egg and Nori are good with soba.

Mori Soba

Mori Soba is the simplest cold type soba dish.
Boiled soba is rinsed in cold water.
And drained off the water, and searved on such a squarish plate.

We put some Wasabi and choped green onion into the cold broth which is made by adding Kaeshi(made from soy sauce, sweet sake, and so on) to Dashi ( stock made from dried bonito ).
We take a bite full of soba with chopsticks and dip it in the broth slightly and eat.

Mori soba is really simple soba dish.
So we can enjoy the taste of Soba.

Sobalier Gathering

I was invited to attend a gathering of "sobaliers". Not wine sommeliers, but experts on soba. The event took place at a temple on the outskirts of Tokyo in Nerima-ku. In the morning we watched as soba was made from scratch using a blend of buckwheat from Hokkaido, Tochigi and Yamagata. Kobayashi Sensei was from a soba restaurant, Oji. Mixing about 10% water to 90% buckwheat flour and carefully rolling it out to then be cut with a special soba knife.

The temple bells began to ring and we all gathered in front of the jizo in front of the temple. In the background you could hear the chanting by the temple's priest.

We all offered up senko incense to the jizo, lined up to give our thanks as we placed the senko in the ashes and retreated to inside the temple. The street is actually lined with 11 temples on this side street.

A rakugo artist offered up a talk of soba, the history, its health benefits, the art of making soba and of famous shops around Tokyo. It is a large group of about 50-60 people and at 40 years old, I am on the young side. Most of them are elderly men with a few spouses tagging along. The event is quite serious.

In the Buddhist tradition we should attain to be happy. 

The rakugo artist uses his sensu fan as chopsticks to pretend to be eating soba.

Soba no koshi (texture)

tsuyu (the dipping sauce)

1. taste the soba

2. taste the tsuyu

3. add yakumi (negi)

4. only dip 1/3 of the soba into the tsuyu

5. slurp with force

6. soba-yu

We are invited to move into the dining area where we can try the handmade soba. It is a serious time and much like sommeliers discussing the merits of wine, I am surrounded with sobaliers who are deconstructing the soba. It is so serious it lacks the joie de vivre I came looking for.

Soba comes from Canada, Australia and China.

The soba-yu added to the tsuyu at the end helps to bring out the umami in the sauce of katsuo, soy sauce and mirin.

Kake soba

Soba is a Japanese thin noodle made from buckwheat.

Kake soba is the simplest hot type soba dish.
Boiled soba is drained. and put into bowl. Poured soysauce based hot broth.
"kake" means "pour" in English in this case.
And topped with finely sliced green onion.
We usually sprincle a little of red peper on it.

The broth is made from soysauce, sweet sake, and dried bonito.
It is mild flavor.