cook

This is the second summer since I started soba workshops.  I never thought I would be in so deep with soba.  My second refrigerator is full with flour.  I actually get anxious when my soba flour stock begins to run low.  

Student making soba

I used to do the workshops at home but now I am also going out to places likeTortoise in Venice and the Japanese American National Museum in Little Tokyo.  Doing these workshops take a lot of work but I love doing them. 

You want your workshop to run smoothly but sometimes you can run into unexpected surprises. Last week, when I did a udon workshop at the museum, a wedding was double booked by mistake and the kitchen was not available. There was a whole crew of chefs and waiters bringing in the food when I got there with my soba making tools.  But it all worked

Soba made by a student

out.  The chef was nice enough to give me one burner on the range to cook the noodles.  I had to conduct most of the workshop in another room, using an electric heating unit to make the stock but we managed.   It was a little bit like camping and the noodles turned out delicious.

Roger is cutting the dough

Torotise is an elegant store on Abbot Kinney in Venice.  I didn't experience any glitches here.  Tortoise added this additional room last spring.  It's a gallery of beautiful objects but they also conduct fun workshops like Japanese coffee making, flower arrangement, woodworking, and soba making by hand.  I am the messy one of the group but I bring my assistant to make sure we don't leave any flour around.  

I love being at Tortoise.  It's hard to walk out without not buying something.  Everything they have is made in Japan.  It makes good sense for me to doing a soba workshop here. I will be doing another one soon.

Kneading the dough

Feasting on the soba 

Soba for beginners recipe can be found here.