My first attempt at Japanese Cuisine... Zaru Soba

So as we all know by watching Kung-Fu Panda, noodles are a very important part of the Japanese cuisine. One of the most popular dishes here is called Okinawa Soba. It's a pork-based broth with thicker noodles, chives, and oddly enough, a couple thick slices of glazed salt-pork type meat and pressed fish patties on top. It looks quite odd in the bowl, but I hear it's delicious. I've never had it before, but I'm hoping to soon!

The version of Soba I attempted was a cold noodle dish. It's called Zaru Soba and it's actually quite easy to make, that is if you can actually find the indgredients you're looking for. Luckily for me, I took someone grocery shopping who had already attempted buying the goods once, so she showed me exactly what I needed to get.

It's quite simple to make really. All you need is some high-gluten wheat pasta, (sorry Debbie, no Soba for you!) some Dashi, or a fish-based liquid made from Bonito flake, which is a dried fish, some Mirin, or sweet rice wine, some Soy sauce, a little sugar, and sesame seeds and chive to taste.

You mix all the saucey goods and boil them then cool them in the fridge. While that's cooling, you can start boling the noodles. After they are done, but not over-cooked, ya pop them into a bowl of cold water and ice to super-cool them. While that's cooling, ya can toast some sesame seeds and chop up the chives. Once everything is cool, you plate your noodles on a special little plate that allows any excess water to drip below and keep the noodles somewhat dry. On the side you can fill a container with your sauce you made, and add the sesane seeds and chive to taste. To make it a little extra fancy, you can get this nori, or seaweed, blend to sprinkle on top of your noodles. It's super yummy.

I've included some pics of the ingredients you need, but the plated pics was actually the soba Sarah made since she had the fancy plates and I didn't at the time. I assure you, it was super super yummy and very healthy! The dark bottle with the fish symbol was the Dashi, the bottle of clear-looking liquid was the Mirin, and the other one you can tell what it is because it says Nori. I think I am gonna love cooking Japanese because all the ingredients are super simple, healthy, and easy to make. If you come visit, I'll make it for you!