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Matsumoto has lots to offer its visitors: sake breweries, wasabi farms, the world’s largest private collection of ukiyoe (woodblock prints) and not forgetting one of Japan’s best preserved and visually striking castles. But, unfortunately, many visitors are here just for one day. With the time constrained punter in mind, here is a restaurant which offers Matsumoto’s culinary specialities: soba noodles, wasabi, raw horse meat and sake, located next to the train station’s East Exit (Castle Exit).
Kurekino’s is easily found, with its sake barrels to the right of the entrance and an immured (but visible) soba noodle chef to the left. Inside there are a number of 2 or 4 person tables and also a big wooden counter where one can sit and engage with the other customers.
The most popular dishes are the soba noodle sets. The noodles will either be in hot broth or cold with a dipping sauce, larger sets come with tempura. Raw horse is also on offer on the à la carte menu.
The soba and tempura sets were well presented and large. It doesn’t take a genius to know that the soba is handmade: you passed the soba chef on your way in. But the irregular width of the noodles is also a sign of noodles not processed by machine. The texture of the soba was satisfying (a little denser than wheat noodles) and they had the characteristically nutty buckwheat taste. I opted for the soba in duck broth which was excellent. Duck meat is not very common in Japan so this was an occasional treat.
The cold noodle dishes are also served with a red lacquer jug which contains the hot water in which the soba noodles were cooked (called sobayu, the Japanese word for it sounds a lot better than my English description). This starchy liquid is used to dilute the soy sauce based dip and is drunk at the end of the meal. I’ve come to use the sobayu as a kind of soba restaurant quality yardstick, as I’ve only enjoyed it in better establishments and I enjoyed the sobayu here enough to drink by itself (a habit I’ve never observed anyone else do so don’t necessarily follow my example).
The horse meat here was tender and of good quality. But because raw horse is quite a lean meat don’t expect the delicious fatty flavour associated with good Japanese raw beef. This dish is often served with a little grated ginger, crushed garlic, shredded onions and soy sauce which are added to the thin slices of meat to taste. An ideal accompaniment to the horse is a bottle of cold sake and the staff were more than happy to recommend one from their range of local brews.
Kurekino Ekishaten 榑木野駅舎店 (next to the Matsumoto East Exit (Castle Exit), Shimadachi 859, 390-0852, Click here for location)
Tel: 0263-38-0803
www.kurekino.co.jp
Sets under ¥2000 and the raw horse is ¥870. Sake from ¥400.
Open Daily
Last Order 20:40.