Tori Soba ZAGIN Ikeda — Restaurant in Ikeda

Do yourself a favour and visit this soba joint after you go to the Cup Noodle Museum which is a very short walk away.

Rather than eating cup noodles, you can eat the real thing! 🍜

You order outside on the machine and by using Google Translate, this will help immensely if you can’t read Japanese.

From the moment we entered, the waitress greeted us very warmly and gave us the booth seat. She was extremely helpful and welcoming, knowing full well we were tourists.

The noodle dishes we ordered were the white broth chicken soba soup noodle with the beef sushi, added a soft boiled egg, the raw egg on rice with some condiments and chicken pieces and the dry noodle with a raw egg and chopped onions with the beef sushi and it included a small bowl of rice.

The soup noodles came with a white broth and was frothy! It was so unusual looking but in the best way. The richness and depth of the soup was exemplary. The noodles were perfect, the additional boiled egg inside the soup as well as the fried burdock root made the meal. It was unlike any noodle soup I’ve ever had. 🤤

My husband’s dry noodle dish was outstanding! Once all the ingredients including the raw egg was mixed, it sort of reminded me of Zhajiang Mien. It gave it a thicker and richer sauce which coated the noodles perfectly.

We ate the meal with so much joy and thanksgiving as it would likely be one of our last meals in Japan before departing for our flight back to Australia in the late evening.

I wrote a message of thanks and encouragement and showed it to the chef and the waitress as I wanted them to know how much it meant to us that their food brought us so much joy and comfort.

This is the one and only place I saved in my “Osaka” list for next time as we definitely...

Interesting spot. Modern dark grey interior, wooden trim, bright lights to make the food shine, and some plants to add a green accent. The chef's uniform included a business-like tie, but the man was all smiles. It felt like he really cared about the quality of the food.

I had the chicken broth soba with a side of soft boiled eggs and fried chicken. The chicken broth was unique. It was thick, rich, and savory, but with a hint of something I couldn't place. The toppings of fried burdock root, bamboo shoots, and various cuts of meat were all great. The boiled egg was a beautiful orange on the inside and a light tan on the outside but it was lighter on flavor than I'm used to. The fried chicken was crispy and also delicious; not my favorite ever but still good.

It's a small shop with few workers, like most small ramen stores. They were friendly, and the waitress kindly brought us an English menu when we were taking a long time in front of the ticket...

The server was very polite (emphasis on polite!) and helpful. There is an english menu available for foreigners. The food was delicious with 4 different types of soba. I had the chicken soba where the broth is very rich and creamy. My wife had the mazesoba which is the dry version (think abura soba) which has a little spice kick to it. My daughters had the Tsukesoba (dipping soba) and the Chicken Soba Soup (non creamy version). This place also has a kid's menu.

The place is spotless and professionaly run albeit a little small (18 people capacity). So expect a wait during rush hour. Would definitely recommend anyone to try it if you're passing by here to go to the cup...