Soba Takama

My visit to Soba Takama was on a Sunday at 12:30 in the afternoon. Four people were in line in front of me. Every seat is full inside. The shop front is in the shade but in 95 degrees Fahrenheit Osaka summer, I am sweating profusely. There’s barely any breeze at all. Forty five minutes later, at 1:15pm, I was asked to take a seat inside in one of the waiting seats. But, ahhh, full air conditioning is on and I was instantly cooled. After another ten minutes wait, I was given a seat at the long table. Food came about fifteen minutes after that. By the time, I finished eating, it was 2:40pm. One couple has not been served yet. They are supposed to close at 2:30pm. 😩 I asked for the check and the younger lady gave it to me ten minutes later. By the time I walked out the door, it was almost 3pm or 15:00. I did not mind waiting. This is a very good soba place that is worth waiting for. The reason that I am giving you the timeline is so that you can determine how much time it would take to dine here. Squeezing it in an hour before your flight is not going to do it. I ordered a plate of tempura and inaka soba (darker colored one) with duck soup. I asked for a smaller portion of soba. The tempura had good quality ingredients and it was done well. There were two shrimps, one piece of fish, mochi, lotus root, sweet potato, eggplant, corn, green beans, okra, and fig. It was my first time having fig tempura. It was sweet and slightly mushy. Personally, I would rather have pumpkin in its place. Overall, it’s good tempura, but if I had to do it all over again, I would just get the soba and duck soup. This soup was delicious as a dipping soup for the soba. I highly recommend it. In the soup, there are two pieces of duck meat and a small clump of ground meat. I will try mori soba next time. Soba water is given towards the end to mix with the leftover duck soup and drink. I would prefer the soba water by itself rather than mixing it with the soup. As I walked back to the train station, I noticed that I did not have any headache or body rush that is synonymous with MSG overload. I felt fine, just very very full. I am grateful to be able to taste this soba today. ps. I believe this is a cash only establishment.