Noodles ── Soba
Sunaba-kei
The Sunaba lineage — an Edo soba school whose roots are said to trace back to Osaka
One of Edo's three great soba lineages. Its name is said to trace back to 1583, to a soba shop standing at a construction-supply yard called Sunaba during the building of Osaka Castle. The lineage is said to have moved to Edo once the Tokugawa took power, becoming known for a thin, long, smoothly sliding noodle.
What it's made of
Soba in the Sunaba lineage is also said to run close to the nihachi ratio, prized for a thin, long noodle that slides smoothly down the throat. Some shops are said to vary how the dough is worked depending on the dish — kneading the flour for zaru with egg water, for instance, and the flour for mori with plain water alone.
How it's made
Particular care is said to go into working the water in and rolling the dough out, aimed at a thin, even noodle strand throughout. Through a system of noren-wake branching that has continued since the lineage moved to Edo, shops carrying the Sunaba name spread across the city, passing down both technique and how the dipping sauce is built.
Why it took this shape
The name is said to trace back to around 1583, when Toyotomi Hideyoshi was building Osaka Castle, to a soba shop standing near a construction-supply yard called Sunaba. Once the Tokugawa took power, the lineage is said to have moved to Edo, continuing there as one of the city's longest-running names — including Toranomon Osakaya Sunaba, open since 1872. The story of a lineage born in Osaka and raised in Edo is passed down as the very reason behind its name.
Before You Go
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Dishes in the same style
- Baniku SobaFrom the Aso area of Kumamoto: hot soba topped with horse meat simmered sweet and salty. It's said to carry the history of a region where horse meat took root as a restorative food for the injured and ill.
- Cha SobaA kawari-soba made by kneading powdered green tea, often matcha, into the buckwheat dough. It takes on a faint green tint along with tea's own aroma. It is said to be one of the playful noodle variations devised during the Bunka-Bunsei era (1804–30), alongside yuzu-flavored soba.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Contrast
- Sarashina-keiOne of Edo's three great soba lineages. It is said to trace back to 1789, when a man from Shinshu hung a sign reading "Shinshu Sarashina Soba Shop, Nunoya Tahei" in Azabu Nagasaka-cho, Edo. The lineage is said to have built its name on pale sarashina soba alongside colorful kawari-soba.
- Yabu-keiOne of the three great soba lineages of Edo. In the closing years of the shogunate, a shop called Tsutaya, near Nezu's Dango-zaka slope, was surrounded by a bamboo thicket — yabu — and came to be known by that nickname, which is said to have settled into its shop name. The lineage is said to work from a base nihachi ratio.