【Yamagata, Japan】Beauty food “Soba” noodle hopping at “Shichibei soba” -Fresh and lighter taste with grated daikon radish soup-

You know what you can’t miss in Yamagata. That is of course soba noodle shop hopping!
And soba(buckwheat), is such an attractive food for people who are caring about their diet or are conscious about being beauty and healthy.

*Some of the posts include affiliate links in the blog.

Overview

Review by hearts

Advantage

◆Guilt-free

You can try body-delighting options like soba noodles, grated daikon radish soup, duck, herring, etc
One of the great options as a staple food substitute.

◆Beauty food

You can try body-delighting options like soba noodles, grated daikon radish soup, duck, herring, etc
One of the great options as a staple food substitute. But you need to take care of the tempura♡

◆Lactose-free friendly

Less or no lactose in soba. But please note that the soba soft(Buckwheat soft serve ice cream) is made with milk products.

*FYI, you can see the review criteria on this blog from here:)

【Dining and food】Review Criteria in Morena Journal

Features or strength

The main shop, well-known by people in Yamagata, is in Ohishida. They serve “Jinengo soba” which is unique in the Jinengo district in Ohishida. So what makes it more unique and special? The answer is the local buckwheat “Raikoji zairai” and the grated radish soup. There are lots of soba shops in Yamagata but not that much places where you can eat the local buckwheat and the special soup.

Appearance

This is the entrance. The shop looks new and clean Japanese traditional style.
As this is a popular place, we can see some waiting people outside of the shop.
There’s a large parking lot and some people are waiting in their cars when it’s too hot or cold.
*This picture was taken just before the closing.

Inside

It was more clean and spacious than it looked. There are table seats and “zashiki”(tatami seats).

And some autographs are hung in the shop!

Menu

Here’s the menu of the Higashine branch. It seemed lots of people ordered “Ten-zaru”(soba with tempura).

FYI, you can see the price table in the menu, and they are different depending on the size. Please refer to the Japanese size from below.

小盛り	Small
並盛り	Medium
大盛り	Large

There were some seasonal limited menus when I visited there in the winter. (Jan, 2024)

And here’s the drink menu. As Yamagata is one the great rice-producing places and famous for Japanese sake, they also had local special sake like “Hatsumago” or “Yamaboushi”.

You can try “all you can eat” soba in Ohishida, the main shop! But please note it’s only in the main shop, not in the Higashine branch. Their soba is made with 90% of buckwheat and 10% of wheat. It’s not gluten-free but the buckwheat ratio is high. (Lots of places have 20% wheat soba.)

Orders

I’ve been there several times and tried some things!

Regular Menu

◆Appetizer(Part of cover charge)

They serve appetizers at first. You can try the pickled kikurage(Jew’s ear mushroom) and warabi(wild vegetable) and it’s inclusive, with no additional payment. The amount was also good enough.
The texture was chewy and you can enjoy a different taste with the mustard on the side.

◆Ten-zaru(Soba with Tempura)

This is the Ten-zaru, normal regular.

They served the freshly fried crunchy tempura! This is one of the positive points as some places serve prepared and a bit cold. You can also enjoy various tempura like 2 shrimp, white fish, oba(shiso leaves), mushroom or so. (They may change.) The white fish was soft and moist. I liked it!

The soba was a thick noodle, not too firm but al dente. So nice! Put some dashi(Japanese broth) in the daikon radish soup and you can eat tempura lighter. This is also a nice point and I became addicted:)

◆Kaimochi(Buckwheat Mochi)

And this is how Kaimochi looks.

I like soba eaten as a noodle but you can enjoy various tastes with the sauce, egoma(perilla), natto, and grated daikon radish.
I like egoma sauce as it has a sweet taste and I felt like eating dessert♡

You can eat buckwheat like mochi and the GI will be lower than sticky rice. So the blood sugar level also rises slower than the later one.
As it has a unique buckwheat flavor, the taste is different from sticky rice mochi but one of the great options as a substitute.

Seasonal limited

Don’t you want to eat something if it’s said “limited”? Well, I do!
Here are some things that I tried there.

◆Kamo-jiru(Duck soup, only in winter)

This is Kamo-jiru which is served only in winter.

The duck fat includes unsaturated fatty acid, which is said that it can lower the blood cholesterol. Such a rare meat in the animal fat.
You can take a nice protein through the duck.

I thought Kamo-jiru was served with small bowl but it was served with nabe(pot). Some people might be full of it. The price was 600 yen which is reasonable! This does not include soba but you can also eat this pot as dipping soup when you order the soba. That’s also a good combination:)

◆Agedashi-Kaimochi(Fried Buckwheat Mochi with Japanese broth soup, only in winter)

This is also seasonal limited, only in winter!

I’ve never seen it in other places. The texture of this unique menu is chewy and I felt like eating agedashi-dofu(fried tofu with Japanese broth soup) but more chewy sticky mochi-like, which is what I like! I want to eat it again♡
This is also served with grated daikon radish so it made the taste lighter though it was fried.

◆Soba soft (Buckwheat soft serve ice cream, not in winter)

This is actually not in the menu in winter but you can also enjoy the soba sweets here! Soft serve ice is a unique sweet in Japan and it contains soba. Such a special and unique sweet!

This is also made with local buckwheat “Raikoji zairai”. The taste is refreshing and you can also feel soba aroma, which makes it more special and unique of this place. I’m not too sure if they use this corn but it was also rare waffle corn and that was also tasty:)

Buckwheat includes quercetin which has a strong antioxidant effect and strengthens the capillary, and vitamin B family that promotes the carbohydrate and fat. metabolism. I took it as it promoted my carbohydrate and fat and caring aging at the same time haha.
Anyway, this is one of my favorites as a guilt-less sweets♡

Store info

The store I introduced this time was the Higashine branch.
Higashine is also a snowy place but the main store is located in a heavier snow area. So it might be more accessible and they also have a spacious parking lot.

Working hour: 11:00am-03:00pm
Closed: Wednesday
(As of Apr, 2024)

*The working hour is by 3 pm but the store closes when the soba is out of stock. So it would be better to go there at the early time if you don’t want to miss it. I’ve also missed it once when I visited there around 2 pm.

Others

・You might need to wait in line as this is a popular store. (Not always but I’ve ever waited 40-60mins in the past.) When I visited there on the weekend around 1 pm, I shifted the time a bit late and I could go inside after about 20 minutes.

・As I described in the store info above, the store closes when the soba is out of stock. You need to take into account the working hours can be changed depending on their stock.

・They only accept cash. You cannot use credit cards.

・Higashine branch is also in snowy place but the main store is located in heavier snow area. You might be able to access the Higashine branch more easily.

・The dipping soup is made with katsuo(bonito) so it’s not for vegans or vegetarians. But you can ask only vegetable tempura. (This is tempura, so eggs might be used.)

Impression

This is one of my favorite places in Yamagata and I’ve visited several times!
I felt the value of the price was nice as every soba menu was served with appetizers and everything was so good.
I have a sweet tongue and they serve such nice guilt-less sweets for me. That’s why I like there:) Hope they can serve it in the winter too!
I would prefer if it’s 100% buckwheat made but I can recommend this place as you can eat not only noodle but also various other menus made with beauty food ingredient buckwheat. Hope you can enjoy it:)