| 江戸蕎麦 ほそ川（墨田区） Edo Soba Hosokawa(Sumida-, Tokyo) Ryogoku / Soba  This is one of the best restaurants in Japan, having received one Michelin star for 10 consecutive years! Lunch:￥1,000~￥1,999 Dinner:￥5,000~￥5,999 Edo Soba Hosokawa Official Website |
This soba noodle restaurant gives you a sense of the refinement of Edo the moment you step inside.
On this day, I had work in Kinshicho, which is unusual for me.
As it’s an area I don’t often visit, I looked up some restaurants in advance and found a good-looking soba restaurant in Ryogoku, which is one stop away.
So that’s why I went to “Edo Soba Hosokawa”, which is near Ryogoku Station on the Oedo subway line.
It opened at 11:30, and I arrived at around 11:25, but there were already two customers there.
We were shown in at exactly 11:30, and as we passed through the shop curtain, a large magnolia flower caught our eye.
It was a very magnificent magnolia, and at that point we felt that there was something different about this soba shop.
As soon as I was shown to my seat, tea was brought over, and it was delicious.
The tea itself was delicious, but the feel of the teacup in my hand was pleasant, and although it looked simple, it had a certain charm.
I thought it might be Mino-yaki (a generic term for pottery produced in the Tōno region of Gifu Prefecture), so I asked the shop staff, and it turned out to be Oribe Mino-yaki.
At this point, I was completely charmed by the shop.
The cold oyster soba I was looking for was already sold out!
I was actually attracted to the cold oyster soba I saw on my mobile phone, but when I looked at the menu, it said “starts in summer”, so I couldn’t order it.
I thought it was served in winter, but it was the opposite.
It was a shame, but I ordered the spicy grated radish soba (1,800 yen) instead.
The spicy grated radish soba is served with the soba sauce already poured over the soba.
I took a bite of the soba.
The soba was thin and chewy, and the soba sauce, which had soaked in well, spread out in my mouth and was delicious.
The spiciness of the soba sauce, the amount, and the chewy texture of the soba all seemed to have been calculated.
It was exactly to my taste, and it was so delicious that I was moved.
About Edo Soba Hosokawa
Edo Soba Hosokawa has been listed in the Michelin Guide Tokyo every year since 2009 (it has received one star nine times), and is a famous soba restaurant recognized by many foodies.
The owner, Takashi Hosokawa, is a supreme soba chef who has created his current style almost entirely on his own, without any experience working at a long-established soba restaurant.
On the other hand, he is also making every effort to pursue a taste that he can be satisfied with, and he is seeking guidance from Mr. Fumio Kondo, the owner of Tempura Kondo, for tempura, and from Mr. Kunihiro Takahashi, who is known as the god of soba making, for soba.
The reason I felt that the soba here was a little like the soba at Soba Restaurant Ten-an in Takachiho, Miyazaki Prefecture (a soba restaurant opened in 2005 and run by a friend of mine who has known me for 35 years) may be because of my connection with Kunihiro Takahashi.
Although Edo Soba Hosokawa already seems to have reached the pinnacle of Japanese soba, I think they will continue to work tirelessly in the future to aim for even higher levels of soba making.
Access, reviews
You can check the access, opening hours, days closed, reviews, etc. for “Edo Soba Hosokawa” on the Google Map (click to enlarge) below.
