Half Day Trip at Roadside Station Seiryu-no-sato Shirotori

Having Soba noodles made from the local buckwheat at Shirotori and Takasu, Gensuke-san

We are going to have freshly grinded, made and boiled soba noodles at Gensuke-san. They are using buckwheat from local and water from Gujo that makes me feel excited! There are chair seats and seats require shoes-off.

Many kinds of Soba noodles, Hoba-zushi (Magnolia leaves sushi) and Gohei-mochi (Rice cake with soy sauce and miso paste) are available on the menu. The price of Zaru-soba (Cold soba with seaweed and dipping sauce) is 800JPY only! So reasonable! I order “Ennen-gozen” with Zaru-soba, Hoba-zushi, Soba-denraku (Soba with miso paste), a small dish and soba mousse (1280JPY). The Soba noodles is smooth but chewy. It is so delicious! Soba balls with miso paste and springy soba mousse with red bean sauce make me feel all of soba! Together with Hoba-zushi using Gujo’s rice, I can fully enjoy the taste of Gujo in this lunch.

You can see how the Soba is grinded with a stone mill at the entrance. It was written, “We are shy so please do not take pictures or videos.” It shows the personality of workers here. We get the permission to take some pictures this time. “Soba tastes the best when it is freshly grinded, made and boiled! We are making Soba according to the flow of customers.” That is why the Soba here is more delicious!

After having a big lunch, we are heading to buy souvenir! Let us go to the morning market!

Daikon (Radish) from Hirugano, thick Shiitake mushroom and other local food are available at a reasonable price. When we ask the shopkeepers, they recommend Edamame (Green soybeans) and corn in early summer. Especially there are 1000 limited sets of corn for delivery in late July. Many fans buy every year. If you are lucky, you may find it available in this morning market.

Products using Gujo’s Ume (Plum) and other local products are the shop’s most recommended! Wooden craftworks are also available at the back of the shop.

Local souvenir you can only find here is food replica! You can buy them from the shop on the 1st floor of “Yama-no-naka no Sanpuru-ya”. Others like carrot juice, Meiho ham, Gujo miso and snacks, it is difficult to decide what to buy!

In the same building, one of the shops “Minobanba”’s “Hirugano-kogen cream puff” is number 1 seller on the Rakuten Ranking. You can have breakfast, lunch and dessert here. Both eat-in and take-out are okay. I order a dessert for today.

The shop has a large window making it brighter. We choose a seat near to the trees.

I order “Assorted cakes” with the most famous cheesecake and fruit trifle. The taste of the cheesecake is so rich and creamy. There is frozen cheesecake for souvenir. You can taste it at home too. Thus, I am going to try this softy chiffon cake with fresh cream and berries! We come during dessert time this time, but if you come for lunch, you can plus 350JPY to add a dessert buffet with drinks.

There is a baked confectionery corner selling Madeline, leaf pie, cookies. They provide gift boxes for present too.

When you step out of the shop, you can see how the sweets are made at the workshop.

We buy a “Hirugano-kogen Cream Puff” with sales volume of over 10000 pieces per month and fresh Dorayaki (Pancakes with bean jam). The cream puff is made of rice flour making it crunchier. Custard cream is milky but not too sweet. It is so good!

Making food replica, having lunch and sweets and finding souvenirs, are all you can do here at Roadside Station Seiryu-no-sato Shirotori. It is worthy to spend a half day here!