Sōmen

Sōmen (Japanese: 素麺), somyeon (Korean: 소면), or sùmiàn (simplified Chinese: 素面; traditional Chinese: 素麵) are very thin noodles made of wheat flour, less than 1.3 mm in diameter. In China, it is also called guàmiàn (Chinese: 挂面). It is used extensively throughout East Asian cuisines. The most common example is Japanese sōmen and the noodles are usually served cold with soy sauce and dashi dipping sauce, similar to mori-soba (盛り蕎麦) noodles style. The difference between sōmen and another thin Japanese noodles hiyamugi (冷麦) are, hiyamugi is sliced by a knife to make them thin noodles but sōmen noodles are thinned by stretching the dough. The dough is stretched with the help of vegetable oil to make very thin strips and then air dried. When served warm in soup, usually in winter, they are called nyūmen (煮麺) in Japanese.

Dried Sōmen
Alternative names
  • Somyeon
  • sùmiàn
TypeNoodles
Place of originChina, Korea or Japan[1]
Main ingredientsWheat flour
Regional names
Historical name
Chinese索麵
Literal meaningrope noodle
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese素麵
Simplified Chinese素面
Literal meaningwhite noodle
Korean name
Hangul소면
Hanja素麵
Japanese name
Kanji素麺
Kanaそうめん

East Asian cuisines

Japan

Sōmen are usually served cold with a light flavored dipping sauce[2] or tsuyu. The tsuyu is usually a katsuobushi-based sauce that can be flavored with Japanese bunching onion, ginger, or myoga. In the summer, sōmen chilled with ice is a popular meal to help stay cool.

Sōmen served in hot soup is usually called nyūmen and eaten in the winter, much as soba or udon are.

Some restaurants offer nagashi-sōmen (流しそうめん flowing noodles) in the summer. The noodles are placed in a long flume of bamboo[3] across the length of the restaurant. The flume carries clear, ice-cold water. As the sōmen pass by, diners pluck them out with their chopsticks[3] and dip them in tsuyu. Catching the noodles requires a fair amount of dexterity, but the noodles that are not caught by the time they get to the end usually are not eaten, so diners are pressured to catch as much as they can. A few luxury establishments put their sōmen in real streams so that diners can enjoy their meal in a beautiful garden setting. Machines have been designed to simulate this experience at home.

  • Sōmen (in large white bowl at upper-right) with assorted toppings
  • Nagashi-sōmen

Korea

In Korean cuisine, somyeon is used in hot and cold noodles soups such as janchi-guksu (banquet noodles) and kong-guksu (noodles in cold soybean soup), as well as soupless noodle dishes such as bibim-guksu (mixed noodles). It is often served with spicy anju (food that accompanies alcoholic drink) such as golbaengi-muchim (moon snail salad).

  • Five-colour somyeon
  • Boiled somyeon
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See also

References
  1. "麺類雑学辞典「そうめん」". 日本麺類業団体連合会 (in Japanese). Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 4 January 2018.
  2. Hiking in Japan - Richard Ryall, Craig McLachlan, David Joll. p. 177.
  3. Adika, Alon (September 21, 2013). "Tsushima: a boundary island of Japan". The Japan Times. Retrieved 19 October 2013.
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