The Ultimate Torigen Soba Made with Cheap Dried Noodles and Chicken Tempura: Ryuji's New Year's Eve Soba

The video proceeds in order through the seasoning for the chicken tempura, a broth made with three kinds of dashi, the batter and frying method, and a method of boiling dried noodles starting from cold water. It ends with tasting and a look back on the year with the staff.

The only ingredients used are green onion and chicken. One chicken thigh (about 300g) is used for two servings. That is 150g per serving, so the cut pieces are quite large. According to Ryuji, he had in mind a station soba stand in Abiko, Chiba, that serves soba topped with a large piece of karaage. Ryuji's view is that you can't be satisfied unless you eat about half a chicken thigh, and that even with karaage, 150g is only about four pieces, which isn't enough. People who still find it too much can cut it into thirds. At 100g each, it makes three servings. He explains that you just need to remember the seasoning amounts as "the amount for 300g of chicken."

Pounding the chicken makes it tender, but you can skip it if it's a hassle. If you pound it, it spreads out and makes an even bigger chicken tempura.

The marinade is seasoned much like karaage. Ryuji says this flavor goes well with soba. Put the chicken in a bowl and add soy sauce, 5–8g of ginger for aroma, and sake. He first says "about 2 teaspoons" of sake, then corrects himself to 4 teaspoons. He adds 6 shakes of umami seasoning, saying "it tastes better with a little in it." Massage it in and let it marinate for a while so the flavor soaks in. This makes it a little salty, but he says that suits soba. He also added that the chicken in this state is delicious fried as is.

The broth is for two servings and uses 700cc of water, 2 tablespoons and 1 teaspoon of soy sauce, 2 tablespoons of mirin, and 1 teaspoon of sugar. The sweetness is kept restrained. For dashi, he uses Hondashi "because it's easy," and adds 1 teaspoon each of chicken bone stock and kombu dashi. If you don't have kombu dashi, you can use 2 teaspoons of Hondashi instead.

Ryuji explains that with three kinds of dashi—chicken, bonito, and kombu—it becomes "a seriously deep flavor." It's delicious with all Hondashi too, but he says using three kinds gives it a "properly made" feel. He also mentions something he noticed while making hot pots recently: using three kinds of dashi usually makes things tastier and gives a more complex flavor.

For the broth, you just add the ingredients and bring it to a boil. Ryuji thinks that because the chicken tempura takes effort, nobody will make the dish unless at least the broth is simple.

He also touches on the workflow. It's good to fry the chicken tempura first, let it rest, and combine it with the soba later. Even soba restaurants sometimes put tempura fried a little in advance on soba rather than adding it freshly fried. Ryuji says this lets beginners make it without rushing.

The batter isn't made in a separate bowl. Add cake flour and potato starch directly to the bowl with the marinated chicken. For two servings, use 4 tablespoons of cake flour; for one serving, half that. Then add 3 tablespoons of water, mix, and massage it in. Ryuji says this is the easiest way to make tempura.

The texture becomes "coarse and crunchy." Ryuji's view is that a coarse batter suits tempura placed on soba. It's best when the flour clings to the meat a bit, which creates a crunchy batter. The amount of water varies depending on how the flour absorbs it, so adjust by sight. The target is a consistency where not much flour remains when you lift it.

Put in about 1cm of oil from the bottom of the pot. The video used rice bran oil, but salad oil is fine too. Ryuji says it's easier than shrimp tempura because while the chicken tempura fries, you just boil the soba and combine it with the warm broth.

When the oil starts bubbling with a fizzing sound, it's a sign it's ready for frying. Put in the heavily battered chicken while spreading it out. If possible, put it in skin-side first. Keep the temperature at around 170°C over medium heat. He says if you raise it to about 190°C, sometimes only the batter cooks and the inside doesn't cook through. In the end it comes down to feel, but he explains that medium heat is basically fine. Putting in a large piece lowers the oil temperature, so adjustment is needed. Watching how the bubbles formed partway through frying, Ryuji pointed out that "right about now is really good."

He says the nice golden color comes from the soy sauce in the marinade. Even if you pull out the thick parts early, they'll cook through with residual heat. You can also fry extra, cut it to place on top, and have the rest as a snack with drinks. Those who want something lighter can remove the skin. Ryuji says it has fat but isn't heavy, so anyone who can eat tempura soba will be fine.

When a staff member asked, "Can you do this with mushrooms?" Ryuji answered, "I think it would work, but it's a bit different." Since the marinade contains ginger, meats like pork are better substitutes, and among mushrooms, king oyster mushrooms might work. For people who want to make soba with a large vegetable tempura, he recommends the previous year's kakiage soba video.

The method for boiling the soba was introduced as a "level-up" from the previous year. Put the dried noodles in cold water and then turn on the heat, instead of putting them into boiling water. Ryuji explains that heating from cold water lets the noodles keep absorbing water, which eliminates the floury taste of the wheat. There is also a method of soaking the noodles in water beforehand, but depending on the product they can get too soft, so he uses this method without soaking.

Since the noodles don't all fit in a regular pot, he uses a frying pan that fits them without breaking them. Ryuji said, "Mori also said boiling in a frying pan is good." When asked whether to break the noodles, he answered that if you break them you can't slurp them, and soba is best slurped. From there the conversation drifted, including a remark that the California roll was invented overseas but is delicious, and that if something's delicious, that's good enough.

When boiling, add about 1 and a half teaspoons of oil. He says this keeps the noodles from sticking together and gives them a smooth texture. He explains that this is a method for making noodles tasty that a soba restaurant talked about, which he read in an article.

Use high heat, because heating slowly makes the noodles gummy. Ryuji explains that heating from cold water lets absorption and boiling happen at the same time, making them really delicious. He said the boiling time after it comes to a boil is about half the time on the package; for noodles labeled 4 minutes, about 2 minutes is the guideline. In the demonstration, he turned off the heat just under a minute after confirming the water was boiling not only at the edges of the pan but in the center too.

He says the cooking water turning white is a sign that wheat is dissolving out, not scum. Ryuji says this method is for making cheap dried noodles taste good, and for expensive noodles with a high proportion of buckwheat flour, you should just boil them normally as the package says. He also remarked that this method is fine for Topvalu soba.

When the staff asked whether it could be used for pasta or udon, Ryuji answered as follows. It works for pasta, and a method called soaked pasta is also well known. But pasta is tastiest with a little firmness left at the core, so he personally doesn't really recommend it. Udon is thick, so it seems like it would take a long time. He feels it works well because soba is about this thin.

Rinse the boiled noodles in water and squeeze out the water. Put them into the boiling broth and reheat over high heat, and it's done. Ryuji explains that because the noodles were chilled once, their firmness at the core is preserved.

Place the soba in a bowl, top with the chicken tempura, and add plenty of scallions. Sprinkle shichimi to taste. Because the chicken tempura is large, it looks bold; a staff member said, "Let's cut it," and Ryuji replied, "Bite right into it."

A staff member who ate it said of the soba, "It doesn't have that dry, crumbly feel of cheap soba." Ryuji revealed that these were the cheapest noodles. As for the chicken tempura, a cast member said, "The ginger is great," and Ryuji said it's delicious on its own, but putting it in soba really shows its potential. The batter soaked in broth was also well received.

The low cost of ingredients also came up. The broth can be made with dashi you have at home, and chicken is plenty without buying shrimp. Ryuji added that it can also be made with chicken breast. A staff member said, "I'd never thought of chicken tempura." Another comment was that if you're making something like shrimp kakiage, chicken is also an option, and that it can be a main dish for lunch or dinner even outside New Year's Eve. Ryuji praised the broth as quietly excellent, and wrapped up by asking viewers to try the three elements—the soba boiling method, the chicken tempura, and the broth—just as shown.

At the end, the cast and staff tried to look back on the year's events. However, most of it was stuff that "can't be used in the video," and nothing was discussed in specifics. Ryuji said he's so busy every day that he forgets. Regarding staff member Takao, the conversation was that this year was peaceful since Takao neither lost a phone nor got injured. They agreed there had been no major online backlash. They also touched on something that went viral online at the beginning of the year, but it had already been forgotten, and Ryuji said he felt that online backlash isn't really that big a deal.

The video ends with a call for viewers to share in the comments which videos left an impression on them this year, saying that if there are such videos, it would make him want to shoot more like them.