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–+ servings

Tempura Soba Noodle Soup (Tensoba)

Prep Time15 minutes
Cook Time15 minutes
Chilling time30 minutes
Total Time1 hour
Author Yuto Omura
Servings 4 portions

Ingredients 
 

Tempura

  • 150 ml cold water thoroughly chilled in the fridge
  • 100 ml carbonated water chilled, or use extra cold water instead
  • 30 g cornstarch
  • 150 g unbleached cake flour or pastry flour, low-protein, around 7-8%
  • unbleached cake flour as needed, for dusting
  • 1 egg chilled
  • 8 large shrimp 16/20 count is the guide, shelled with the tails left on
  • 4 fresh shiitake mushrooms stems removed
  • 100 g eggplants cut into wedges and soaked in cold water
  • 8 perilla leaves (shiso)
  • cooking oil neutral with a high smoke point, such as rice bran, rapeseed or vegetable oil

Soba and tsuyu

Toppings (optional)

  • finely chopped green onions as needed
  • kamaboko fish cake as needed
  • Japanese chili powder (shichimi togarashi) as needed
  • dried wakame seaweed rehydrated, as needed

Instructions 

  • Chill 150 g unbleached cake flour, 30 g cornstarch, 150 ml cold water, 100 ml carbonated water and 1 egg in the fridge for 30 minutes.
    Still water in a jug and sparkling water in a sealed bottle
  • Shell 8 large shrimp, leave the tails on and pull out the veins. Rub them with salt and cornstarch, rinse under cold running water and pat dry.
    coating raw black tiger shrimp in salt and starch to clean
  • Lay each tail flat, fold it in half and trim it at an angle. Turn the belly up and cut slits 1 cm apart, halfway into the flesh. Hold both sides with the belly still up and press from the tail end until you hear a small snap.
    making incisions along the body of shrimp so that it doesn't curl when cooking
  • Bring 1000 ml dashi stock to a boil in a saucepan and add 5 tbsp Japanese soy sauce (koikuchi shoyu) and 2 tbsp mirin. Simmer 2 to 3 minutes, turn off the heat and stir in ½ tsp salt. Cover and set aside.
    Kake soba soup on a wooden spoon held above the pan for taste testing
  • While the broth cools, remove the stems from 4 fresh shiitake mushrooms, cut 100 g eggplants into wedges and soak them in cold water, then wash and dry 8 perilla leaves (shiso).
    Cut eggplant for tempura soaking in a bowl of water
  • Heat the cooking oil to 180 °C (356 °F). Combine the chilled cold water and carbonated water, beat in the egg and skim off the foam. Add the chilled dry mix in 3 additions, folding roughly each time. Leave the lumps.
    whisking dry ingredients into egg mixture with chopsticks to make tempura batter
  • Dust the shrimp and vegetables with cake flour and shake off the excess. Coat and fry them in batches by type, in the order of perilla leaves, shiitake, eggplant and shrimp. Lift each piece out as the batter puffs and before it colors, and spread it on a wire rack. Skim the loose batter each time.
    ebiten (shrimp tempura) frying in oil
  • Bring water to a boil in a separate pot and cook 400 g dry soba noodles to the time on the bag. Drain, rinse under cold water while rubbing the surface, and drain again. For hot soba, boil fresh water, dip them for a few seconds and drain once more.
    cooking soba noodles in a large Japanese yukihira pot on the stove
  • Divide the soba between bowls, reheat the tsuyu and pour it over. Add the tempura, then scatter finely chopped green onions, kamaboko fish cake, Japanese chili powder (shichimi togarashi) and rehydrated dried wakame seaweed to taste. Enjoy!
    Tempura soba topped with tempura shrimp and vegetables, chopped green onions, kamaboko fishcakes and wakame seadweed in a striped bowl on a dark wooden effect background

Notes

Keep every part of the batter cold: Flour, water and egg go in the fridge 30 minutes before frying. Keep the bowl away from the stove and return the leftover batter to the fridge between batches. Warm batter drinks oil instead of puffing.
Stop mixing while flour is still visible: A batter mixed smooth has already failed. Stop while white streaks and lumps are still sitting in the bowl. A few cutting strokes with chopsticks is the whole job.
Snap the belly tendons, do not just score: Slits alone will not stop the shrimp from curling. What holds it straight is the tendons along the belly giving way, not the depth of the cuts, and until you hear the snap they have not.
Fry the tempura before you boil the soba: Soba waits for nobody once it is drained. Get every piece of tempura fried and spread on the rack, then boil the noodles last.
Avoid bleached cake flour: Avoid bleached or chlorinated cake flour, self-rising flour, and gluten-free blends, as they change the texture. For UK/AU readers, plain flour works. See my flour guide.
A note on the nutrition figures: In Japan, the broth of a noodle soup like this is not finished to the last drop, so the numbers here assume you drink only about 30 percent of the soup, in line with measured Japanese consumption studies. Finish the whole bowl and the figures, sodium above all, will run considerably higher.