Wanko Soba in Morioka

Wanko Soba

“Don’t chew”, my boss reminded, “and don’t drink the soup either, it will only slow you down. Actually, don’t even think, just eat”.

“How many did you eat?” I asked.

“154” was the reply.

“Damn, that’s a lot. My goal is 150”, I said, gazing over his shoulder. It was the night before my winter vacation began. I had two goals, actually; the first was to be in Morioka the next day, and the second was to engage in the food challenge known as Wanko soba.

Morioka is a fairly large sized city about 2 hours north of beautiful Fukushima. Its claim to fame is that there are lots of rivers, and lots of tasty kinds of noodles. Wanko soba is the most famous noodle from Morioka because of the ridiculous ceremony that is involved while eating. People in Morioka are friendly, but they are also very hungry. This is true, because the point of the game is to try to eat as many of these little bowls of noodles as you can. The portions are just a bit bigger that bite-sized but the trick is to swallow the noodles whole. I was skeptical about this so-called “trick”.

When I stepped off the train, I was greeted by a blast of cold air and the satisfaction of completing my first goal: I had arrived in Morioka. It was about 4pm, and the sun was in its last stages of descent into the ocean. I walked out of the station and was instantly covered in powdery, dry snow. I ran, carefully on the ice, to my hotel, checked in and cowered in my room while debating whether or not I should go back to Fukushima to escape the cold. I thought about my itinerary of heading farther and farther north to eventually make it to Sapporo by New Year. I shivered at the thought.

I put on my down coat, and took off outside. I was going to eat Wanko soba. My stomach was growling words of motivation to me; I hadn’t eaten anything, except for two small rice balls that day. I checked the map to the restaurant and started walking. The snow was heavy, but it was dry and didn’t melt on my jacket. The fresh powder also made walking on the ice easier, providing a bit of traction. Walking on ice was something I was going to learn a lot about during my vacation….

I walked for about 30 minutes. I didn’t realize how far away the place was because, like usual, the map wasn’t to scale. This is a common problem in Japan. Whenever I see a map that isn’t from Google, I go to great lengths to avoid using it. But, in this case, I had no choice. I told my self that the walks, and the cold, were only strengthening my appetite.

Finally, I found the street that I thought the restaurant was on and began my search. I saw a family getting out of a car with a massive sumo sized guy in the lead. This was a good sign. He looked like the sort of fellow that considered Wanko soba to be the pinnacle of culinary artistry. I walked near to them, which of course terrified the children. I heard him ask the parking lot attendant about the restaurant, which is called Azumaya. He pointed and I smiled. All I had to do was follow the leader. This was easy, because I was basically at the door, I just couldn’t read the sign. The sumo guy looked at me suspiciously and I said in my best broken Japanese “I want to eat Wanko soba too”. He smiled and held the door open for me.

We were led upstairs, to the thunder dome of the Wanko challenge. The place was basically empty, but I did choose to come here in winter which I’m guessing isn’t the high season for tourists. As I came around the corner into the main eating arena, I was surprised to see another lone wolf foreign traveler, who had obviously already finished eating. He was sprawled out on the tatami floor, with a massive pile of empty bowls in front of him. His bib hung loosely around his neck, his face red and puffy. He looked like Jaba-the-hut; I was excited and terrified at the same time.

We started chatting and he labored to speak.

“How many did you finish?”, I pried.

“142”, he looked ill as he thought about the number. His stacked of dishes looked like the walls of the coliseum in front of him.

“Good luck”, he murmured as he died in front of me. (Not really, but I felt like typing that anyway.) He got up laboriously and engaged in what I soon realized was the most difficult part of the challenge: putting your shoes back on after you leave the tatami area. Bending over to tie my laces was going to be impossible. I pondered as the waitress brought out my spread of food with all the pomp and circumstance associated with an eating challenge.

There were about 15 little dishes with different types of flavoring agents to add to the Wanko soba at the eater’s discretion. I wasn’t interested; I wanted nothing but noodles to fill my stomach. She handed me my bib and told me instructions in Japanese. Apparently, when you are finished you have to grab this lid from off of the table and slam it down on top of your bowl and scream the Japanese equivalent of “uncle”. The waitress would hover over me for the duration of my eating and continue to fill my bowl from her small and numerous bowls, all the while encouraging me.

The challenge began. I held up my bowl and she poured in the contents of a smaller bowl, expertly tossing down the empty serving bowl next to me. I slurped down the noodles without chewing and almost choked, immediately deciding that I would at least chew a few times. I didn’t drink the broth and poured it into a nearby bucket on my table. Before I could look back up at her to request more, she had dumped another portion of noodles into my bowl without me noticing. She was clearly and expert at force feeding people. I looked up at her and she barked “Ganbatte!” which translate roughly to “you can do it!”

I ate and ate, chewing less and less as I went along. Eventually I became sort of stupefied by process and would catch my self almost pouring out the noodles into soup bucket as soon as she added them into my bowl. I was clearly fighting and emotional battle as well as a physical one. My body was trying to trick me into not eating. The woman was forcing me, tormenting me. Occasionally she would refill my bowl and soup would splash everywhere, covering me. She would grin and say sorry and then laugh. The sound of her throwing down the bowls one by one became like some form of torture, the lacquer crack, crack, crack getting louder and louder. It was like a scene from “Saw 14” or “Seven” or some other diabolical movie, except I had sought out and was going to pay monetarily for the torture.

I passed 80 and I knew I was reaching my limit. My stomach was full and I could feel the noodles getting harder to swallow. I reached 90 bowls and decided 100 was my limit. I barely forced down number 100 and made room to set down my bowl….I couldn’t find the fucking lid! Before I knew it she had refilled my bowl and was egging me on to eat more more more. I then realized why there were some many dishes with flavoring agents presented at the beginning of the challenge, not to enhance the noodles, but to hide the lid in order to further the torture. Before I ate bowl 101, I found the lid and held it in my left hand, with my chopsticks, and my eating bowl in with my last portion of noodles was in my right. It was a struggle, but I managed to use my chopsticks while holding the lid, finish the noodles, slam the bowl down and place the lid on top. She was right there on top of me trying to launch one more portion of noodles into my bowl before I could get the lid on. I had forgotten the word I was supposed to yell, so I simply said “finished” in Japanese. She smiled and the evil force feeding look melted from her face. She had returned to her sweet waitress self.

I looked at the stack of bowls in front of me; it was hard to imagine eating the contents of all of them. I asked her about the records and she told me that the men’s record was 430, and the women’s record was…brace yourself…570 bowls. I felt like a chump. The sumo guy I had followed into the restaurant was finishing his meal too, he had eaten 140 something. I need to practice. I don’t remember putting my shoes on…nor do I remember the walk home. It was reminiscent of a night of binge drinking; waking up and realizing that vast swaths of time have disappeared from my life.

If you’re ever in Morioka, you must eat Wanko soba. It’s not very tasty, and it definitely isn’t classy, but it is unique and unforgettable.