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Sōmen facts for kids

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Sōmen
Somen 001.jpg
Alternative names
  • Somyeon
  • sùmiàn
Type Noodles
Place of origin China
Region or state East Asia
Main ingredients Wheat flour
Regional names
Historical name
Chinese 索麵
Literal meaning rope noodle
Transcriptions
Middle Chinese
Middle Chinese /sɑk̚.menH/
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese 素麵
Simplified Chinese 素面
Literal meaning white noodle
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu Pinyin sùmiàn
Wade–Giles su4-mien4
Korean name
Hangul 소면
Hanja 素麵
Transcriptions
Revised Romanization somyeon
McCune–Reischauer somyŏn
Japanese name
Kanji 素麺
Kana そうめん
Transcriptions
Revised Hepburn sōmen

Sōmen (Japanese: 素麺), somyeon (Korean: 소면; 素麵), or sùmiàn (Chinese: 素麵) is a very thin noodle made of wheat flour, less than 1.3 mm in diameter. The noodles are used extensively in East Asian cuisines. Japanese sōmen is made by stretching the dough with vegetable oil, forming thin strands that are then air dried for later use. This is distinct from a similar thin noodle, hiyamugi, which is knife-cut.

In Japan, sōmen is usually served cold with a light dipping sauce called tsuyu. South Korean somyeon may be eaten in hot or cold noodle soups. Sōmen is typically high in sodium.

Other names are nyūmen (煮麺) in Japanese, for a version served warm in soup, and the Chinese name guàmiàn (Chinese: 掛麵), which can be further classified into lóngxū (Chinese: 龍鬚; literally "Dragon Whiskers") for the variant with long and thin strands and fèngwei (Chinese: 鳳尾; literally "Phoenix Tail") for the variant with flat and broad strands.

East Asian cuisines

Japan

TofuSeller1500
Illustration of a tofu seller (right) and a sōmen seller (left) by Tosa Mitsunobu, from the Songs of the Seventy-one Craftsmen (七十一番職人歌合 Shichijūichi-ban Shokunin Uta-awase), a poetry anthology written around 1500

Sōmen are usually served cold with a light flavored dipping sauce 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, just like 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 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 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.

South 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).

Gallery

See also

Kids robot.svg In Spanish: Sōmen para niños

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