Soba Making with Obaachans

Today was Labor Thanksgiving in Japan. As a result, I had the day off work and the cultural salon group in Wajima held a soba-making workshop. Several mothers and grandmothers (obaa-chans) came to teach non-Japanese residents how to make traditional soba noodles. Soba is a buckwheat noodle typically served in a fish-seasoned broth during the fall and winter.

First we made the dough and kneaded it into a pretty substantive ball.

Next, we put it in a garbage bag and stepped on it to flatten it.

Next, patting it smooth, rolling it into a big cirlce, and cutting it into long thin noodles.

 Then we boiled the noodles.

 

 This is a Japanese root that looks solid until you try to grate it. Then it turns into a snot-consistency-mucus. We used the mucus to mix in with the soba and broth to give it more texture and taste. It wasn't half-bad.

The finished product being devoured by the most adorable half-Japanese child ever.

Over all, soba-making was interesting cultural lesson, but way too much work for not enough tastiness. I prefer to eat my soba noodles at soba shops where other people have done the hard work. I have now been recruited to teach an American cooking class for February. Yikes!

Credit for the photographs goes to Adam Fore.