Ingredients

Soba noodles - around 100g per person.

Dashi (dried konbu, katsuobushi flakes, water)

50ml Mirin

50ml soy sauce

10g sugar

Garnish

Method

Boil the soba noodles then - and this is crucial - rinse them under cold running water really well.

For the dipping sauce you’ll need some dashi. Most Japanese use instant dashi granules when cooking at home, but freshly made dashi is infinitely preferable with a deeper, more nuanced flavour, and less salt.

To make it, soak a postcard-sized piece of konbu in a pan of water overnight, slowly bring it almost to a boil but remove the seaweed before the water actually boils (it gets a bit stinky otherwise).

Toss in a good fistful of katsuobushi flakes and let them infuse for a few minutes, strain through a chinois and that’s it. (Bit quicker than veal stock, isn’t it?)

Take around half a litre of dashi, and gently warm it together with about 50ml of soy sauce and 50ml of mirin, and if you like, some sugar.

I always finish with a cheeky squeeze of lemon juice too, though the Japanese might frown on this. The icing on the Zaru soba cake are the garnishes, an art at which the Japanese excel.

Options include some shredded spring onion; fresh ginger, ground to a pulp on an oroshigane (a fine toothed grating board - every kitchen should have one); toasted sesame seeds; lemon- or better still, yuzu zest; fresh ground daikon radish (an oni oroshi, or ‘devil greater’ is best for grating daikon - you can get cheap plastic ones); or perhaps some wasabi.

Incidentally, if you get the chance to try it, fresh wasabi makes a world of difference. And, yes, they even have a special grater for that, made from sharkskin - on which you grate the wasabi root in a circular motion.

After you’ve dipped and eaten the noodles, if you are in one of the better soba restaurants, they will bring you a small tea pot of boiling water with which to transform your remaining dipping sauce into a lovely light broth.

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