Soba Making with HR16

Yesterday I joined HR16 for a soba making class with Mr. Katsumata. Soba is a thin Japanese noodle that is made from buckwheat. I have always wanted to learn how to make soba and was really excited when Mr. Katsumata offered to teach me.  Earlier in the day he taught Mrs. Sekimoto and I and it was a lot more difficult than I thought it would be. When making soba you have to kneed the dough four hundred times and the dough isn't soft like bread dough so it takes a lot of effort. Afterwards the dough is flatten and rolled out, which also takes a lot of effort because it has to be rolled in four different directions to make it into a square. When it is thin enough the flat dough is folded in half, then it is folded from right to left and again from left to right, making a rectangle. Now it is ready to be cut into very thin noodles. Later, I join HR16 for their class and some soba tasting, it was delicious!

 

Some of the class learning how to roll the dough.

 Two of the girls trying their best to keep the noodles thin enough.

The knife looked a little scary but it was fun to use.

Fuka and I were definitely better at cutting udon than soba! Mr. Katsumata cut the perfect noodles, below.

 Ours were not as good!

Hakuba and the Onsen Monkeys

One of my favourite things about Japan is that the ski slopes here are very accessible. From Gotemba you can drive a few hours north and be among the beautiful Northern Alps in Nagano. I usually go to Hakuba, which is where the 1998 Winter Olympics were held. I am definitely not an expect skier but I have been getting better and as long as I keep to the green slopes I'm safe and happy! This is my friend and I enjoying a great day skiing.

There are many great things to do in Nagano apart from skiing. For example, visiting the onsen snow monkeys, which is what I did on my last trip. It has been a dream of mine to visit these monkeys since I watched them on David Attenborough's program, Planet Earth. I think they are incredibly human-like and they remind of old men relaxing by a fire. They were very interesting to watch so I took a lot of pictures. Here is a selection of them below.

We where able to stand really close and they didn't seem to notice us there. This little boy was enchanted by them, so cute!

To get to the monkeys we had to walk for about 20 minutes through the forest. It was beautiful and still because of the snow, we all said it felt like we were in a scene from Norwegian Wood.