Tori Nanban Udon (Japanese Chicken and Leek Udon Soup)

One sip of the broth. The light flavor clings to your tongue, and the chicken umami stays put instead of slipping away. Then, a beat later, the sweetness of seared leek hits.

If I am making udon with chicken thighs, tori nanban udon is the best there is, in my book. I add chicken bouillon powder to the dashi and layer on even more chicken umami.

Chicken nanban udon with tofu and spring onion served in a striped bowl

Tori nanban udon

Recipe Snapshot

What is it? Tori nanban udon is chicken and Japanese leek on udon in hot dashi with soy sauce. It is soba-shop duck nanban made with chicken, on soba or udon in Japan.
Flavor profile: The first thing you taste is deep chicken umami, concentrated in a thickened broth. Bite in and the seared leek tastes sweet while the browned chicken skin smells toasty.
Why this recipe works: My tori nanban udon adds Chinese-style chicken bouillon powder to the dashi, so the chicken umami doubles. Lightly thickened, the broth clings to noodles and toppings, and that umami tastes concentrated.
How to make it: Sear chicken thigh and leek in 1 frying pan, add dashi and season, thicken lightly, and pour over cooked udon. The leek sears in the chicken skin’s fat.
What to expect: Tori nanban udon takes 30 minutes (10 prep, 20 cooking). The one catch is thickening too far, so stop once the broth turns just slightly heavy.

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What Is Tori Nanban Udon?

Tori nanban udon (鶏南蛮うどん) is a hot udon that Japanese soba and udon shops have served for a long time. Chicken thigh seared until browned and thick Japanese leek go into a broth of dashi and soy sauce. It is a standard on those shop menus, and at home it is a bowl I make on weeknights.

Nanban here means the leek. Search chicken nanban in English and Miyazaki’s fried chicken with sweet vinegar and tartar sauce comes up first. That is a separate dish that happens to have a similar name.

The origin of Tori Nanban Udon

It began in the soba shops of Edo. In the Bunka era (1804 to 1818), Sasaya, a shop in Bakurocho in Nihonbashi, is said to have served kamo nanban, duck and Japanese leek over hot soba. Duck was a winter bird and pricey, so chicken, cheap and sold all year, took its place, and tori nanban soba followed. In Japan, soba and udon trade toppings freely. Swap the soba for udon and you have tori nanban udon.

What does nanban mean?

In Japan, nanban was the catch-all word for the people who came from Portugal and Spain and the foreign things they brought. Kiyu Shoran, an Edo essay collection from 1830, also records that things never seen in Japan before were called nanban. In cooking, the meaning branched from there. Nanbanzuke took the vinegar path, with fried fish or meat soaked in a vinegar sauce. The other meaning stayed on soba and udon shop menus. Kamo nanban pairs duck with leek, curry nanban pairs curry broth with leek, and tori nanban pairs chicken with leek. The leek is what earns the name, and the meat simply goes in front of it.

How I make it, and why

Shops and Japanese home cooks mostly settle this bowl with chicken, leek, and dashi broth. I change 2 things. First, I add Chinese-style chicken bouillon powder to the dashi. It is a standard seasoning in Japanese kitchens today, and I use it to layer on more chicken umami. Second, I give the broth a light potato starch thickening at the end. Shops leave the broth thin. I thicken it anyway because a thickened broth lingers in your mouth, and the layered chicken umami tastes concentrated.

Chicken Nanban Udon Ingredients

Ingredients needed to make tori nanban udon on a white background with labels. From top to bottom, left to right: Japanese leek (negi), dashi stock, skin-on chicken thigh, mirin, Japanese light soy sauce (suskuchi shoyu), sake, udon noodles, Chicnese chicken bouillon powder, aburaage (fried tofu pouches).

Japanese leek (naganegi): Pick leeks with a long, thick, straight white part that feel heavy in your hand. Thin ones shrink into stringy strands when they sear, while thick leeks take a browned crust on the outside and stay sweet at the core. They may look alike, but scallions (the slim ones sold as green onions) will not stand in. At an Asian grocer, look for a label reading Japanese leek, naganegi, or Tokyo negi.
Light soy sauce (usukuchi): This keeps the broth pale, so the browned chicken skin and the fat on the surface stay in plain view. The pale part is only the color, though. It is saltier than standard Japanese soy sauce, and adding more because it looks light turns the broth salty fast. Look for a bottle labeled usukuchi.

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Substitutions & Variations

Here are the swaps for anything you cannot find, plus other bowls you can make the same way.

Substitutions:

Japanese leek (naganegi) → leek: The closest swap. Use only the white and pale green parts, and cut the amount to 80g because it comes out sweeter. It takes longer to cook than Japanese leek, so sear it longer, until the cut faces are well colored.
Chicken thigh → chicken breast: Thigh is the better pick if you can get it. Breast has less fat, so the broth turns lighter and the meat dries out fast if it simmers too long. Sear the surface hard, and once it is in the broth, stop the moment it is just cooked through.
Light soy sauce (usukuchi) → standard Japanese soy sauce: Swap it in at the same amount. The broth turns darker and a little less salty, so taste it at the end and adjust with salt.
Chinese-style chicken bouillon powder → Western chicken bouillon powder: Western-style chicken bouillon works too. It carries herbs and spices, so the flavor shifts a little. Skip bouillon cubes, which are too strong, and choose granules or powder.
Dashi stock → dashi packets: My top pick. Homemade or store-bought, dashi packets give you a broth close to dashi made from scratch.
Dashi stock → dashi granules: A broth made with dashi granules works too. Granules carry a fair amount of salt, though, so the whole broth ends up saltier. Go easy on the light soy sauce and salt, and taste before adding more.
Potato starch (katakuriko) → cornstarch: For thickening, cornstarch does the job. It thickens less readily, so use 1.2 times the amount.
Fried tofu pouch (aburaage) → skip it: You can make this bowl without it. Chicken, Japanese leek, and the dashi broth hold it together on their own.

Variations:

Chicken nanban soba: Swap the udon for soba noodles and you have chicken nanban soba. The toppings and the broth carry over as they are. For soba, make the broth just a little stronger.
Clear broth version: Finish without the potato starch slurry. The broth stays thin and clear, closer to what Japanese noodle shops serve.
Eggplant added: Keep the Japanese leek, sear eggplant in the same pan as the chicken, and add it to the broth.

If you want more stand-ins for Japanese ingredients, I keep them in my substitution guide here.

How to Make My Tori Nanban Udon

Before you start (Mise en place):

Trim off only the yellow clumps of fat from the chicken thigh, leave the skin on, and cut it into bite-size pieces.
Cut the Japanese leek into 5cm lengths.
Slice the fried tofu pouches into thin strips.
Stir the potato starch into cold water to make a slurry.

chicken thigh cut into bitesize pieces in a bowl

Aburaage (twice fried tofu) thinly sliced and spring onion cut into thick pieces on a wooden chopping board

Equipment Notes

To develop this recipe, I used a 26cm non-stick frying pan.

A 26cm non-stick frying pan on a white background

STEP

Sear the chicken and the leek

i. Heat a large frying pan over medium heat and add the oil once it is hot.

ii. Lay the chicken skin side down, with the leek in the gaps and nothing overlapping. Overlapped pieces steam instead of searing.

Frying chicken and spring onion in a large frying pan

iii. Leave the chicken untouched until the skin is deep golden, then flip it and sear the other side.

Browned chicken and spring onion in a large frying pan

iv. Meanwhile, turn the leek now and then to brown it all over. Translucent amber cut faces mean it has turned sweet. White and wet, it is still sharp. Black spots and smoke mean it went too far.

Why the leek goes into the chicken fat

Why not just simmer it in the broth? Heat turns the sharp bite of raw Japanese leek sweet, and a hard sear adds a roasted note on top. That pairing is what makes nanban leek, and simmering alone never gets there. So the leek shares the chicken’s pan and sears in the fat that melts from the skin.

STEP

Add the dashi and season the soup

i. Once the chicken is cooked through, pour in the dashi and bring it to a boil.

Dashi poured into pan with chicken and spring onion

ii. Turn the heat down to low and add the Chinese-style chicken bouillon powder, light soy sauce, sake, mirin, and salt. Bouillon powder varies in saltiness by brand, so go a little lighter if yours is a strong one.

iii. Stir well, then add the fried tofu strips.

Tofu and condiments added to broth in pan

Youtube video — Even with the bouillon powder in, dashi is the base of this broth, and here is the video for making it from scratch with kombu and katsuobushi.

STEP

Simmer and thicken the soup lightly

i. Simmer for a few minutes, until the fried tofu is heated through.

ii. Stir the potato starch slurry again, then drizzle it in while mixing the broth, this will prevent the starch sinking and lumping together at the bottom of the pan.

Chicken nanban udon broth lightly thickened with slurry

iii. Simmer for 1 to 2 minutes and turn off the heat once the broth has thickened slightly. It is ready when broth poured from a ladle falls just a touch heavier than water. Do not let it cook too long or turn too thick.

STEP

Assemble the bowls

i. Put the cooked udon into serving bowls. Divide the broth, chicken, Japanese leek, and fried tofu evenly over the top.

ii. Sprinkle with shichimi togarashi (Japanese chili pepper blend) and eat while it is hot.

Completed chicken nanban udon with tofu and spring onion served in a striped bowl

Serving size

If you follow the default recipe, it will yield 2 servings.

Tips for the Best Tori Udon

Leave the chicken alone until it browns. Wait for the skin to release from the pan on its own, and turn the Japanese leek now and then so it colors all over. Move the chicken around or crowd the pan and it steams instead of searing. The broth then never picks up that roasted flavor.
Stay at the stove once the slurry goes in. It only needs 1 to 2 minutes. If broth from the ladle drips off heavily instead of flowing, it has gone too thick.
Look at the bottom of the pan before the dashi goes in. The browned bits give the broth its toasty flavor. If they have burned black, lift out the chicken and leek, wipe the pan, and only then pour in the dashi. Burnt bits leave a bitterness that even soy sauce cannot cover.

Sip the broth first while it is hot, and the chicken umami you built up with the bouillon powder is the first thing you taste.

Storage & Meal Prep

Fridge: Covered and apart from the noodles, the broth and toppings keep 1 to 2 days. Don’t store noodles left in broth, they soak it up and swell.

Freezer: Freeze the unthickened broth and toppings flat in a bag for 2 weeks.

Meal prep: Prepare the unthickened broth and toppings 1-2 days ahead, always cook noodles fresh and thicken right before serving.

Reheating: Reboil the broth and toppings in a pot and thicken now if you stopped early. Heat the udon separately and assemble.

What to Serve With Chicken Udon Soup

Crispy Vegetable Kakiage
Simple Salted Onigiri (Shio Onigiri)
Quick Napa Cabbage Pickles (Hakusai no Asazuke)
Sweet Yellow Daikon Pickles (Takuan)

Tori Nanban Udon Troubleshooting

Why did the slurry turn into lumps?

The starch had settled at the bottom when it went in, or it all landed in a single spot and set right away. Turn off the heat and break up the lumps by stirring the broth in big, quick strokes with cooking chopsticks. Scoop out any lumps that remain with a fine-mesh skimmer, then return the pot to low heat and warm it for about 1 minute.

Why does the soup taste too salty?

Your chicken bouillon powder may be a stronger type than the recipe expects, or extra light soy sauce went in because the broth looked pale. Add dashi or hot water a little at a time, bring it back to a boil, and taste each time. If thinning it loosens the thickness, bring that back with a little extra potato starch slurry.

Why does the leek still taste sharp?

The leek did not sear long enough and went into the broth with its cut faces still white. Lift it out of the broth, sear it in a separate pan until the cut faces turn amber, and put it back.