SOBA

Soba is a kind of noodle, which we Japanese are so familiar with.

It’s made from buckwheat, having greyish color, and eaten with mentsuyu (Japanese noodle soup containing so-called Japanese food essences. ).

You could enjoy it both cold and hot.
On it, we put green onion, seaweed, ginger/wasabi, sesame, tororo, tempura, and so on to arrange the taste.

We often have them especially in summer, the harvest season.

But on new year’s eve we eat it as a tradition which had been fixed in Edo era (like 200-400 years ago) wishing to cut out bad things (thought up from the fact soba is easy to be bitten to cut. ) for the next coming year.

Soba is known as a healthy food.
It has low calories, vitamins, and lots of dietary fiber.
(When you have cheap one at super market, it contains lots of flower too, so it has less these ingredients. )
Here are examples of the effects.

• good for skin
• prevents hypertension
• makes blood vessel strong
• relieves fatigue
• eliminates conspiration

Wanko-soba is a very famous style of eating soba developed and still being in iwate-prefecture.
You have a little bowl and a staff put small amount of soba into the bowl one after another.
It’s challenging how much you could eat.

(people eat like 100 times of the bowl!)

The skin of the seeds is used to stuff pillow or cushion sometimes.
It’s said that it lets heat out and brings you a comfortable sleep.
We could make tea from the skin of seeds and it’s good for health as well.
Also soba has white flowers, they are beautiful.

it’s kind of famous that soba allergy can be very serious.
So there are often cautions in Japanese food products when soba-seed may be contained in. You may be able to a bit attentive descriptions on the back of products.

Soba tastes so good, and definitely one of my favorite Japanese foods.
Hope you’ll have chance to try one!