Nagano, Japan｜SobaYa

Was served by the sweetest restaurant owners who lovingly whipped up the most delicious Soba Omakase for us (Starter - fried soba with veggies, main - cold soba with 3 kinds veggie tempura). It’s the best veggie tempura I’ve ever had; the tempura was lightly fried and I could taste the natural sweetness of the homegrown veggies! They also very kindly offered soba chiffon after the meal to end it off on an even sweeter note!

Very nice place if you want to try LOCAL FOOD. You can experience a set of different dishes based on soba (soba soup, soba, desert made of soba, soba cookies ...). The chief was very friendly. He barely spoke English, but it was not a problem. Two set are available. One around ~1'500JPY (5 dishes including soba) and one about ~2'500JPY. The menu is in Japanese, but just pick one according to how hungry you are and let the chief do the rest. The atmosphere was delightful. The place is about 10 seats. The only downside is that, he is working alone. The dishes come one after another. So don't be starving. You need to count at least 1h30 for the small set. The fact that the dishes come one after another might be an issue for some people. Consider this place as a good opportunity to try new tastes and not to fill your stomach. I would not recommend you this place if you are not patient and eat a lot.

This is a local soba dining bar on the backstreet. You can enjoy soba course as chef’s choice, by only approximately 3,000 yen without alcohol. Though make sure you don’t have soba allergy, if you have it, the shock would be so strong as you might die.