soba

American  

[soh-buh] / ˈsoʊ bə /

noun

plural

soba

1. Japanese Cooking. a noodle made primarily from buckwheat flour, with some wheat flour added.

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soba British  

/ ˈsəʊbə /

noun

1. (in Japanese cookery) noodles made from buckwheat flour

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Etymology

Origin of soba

First recorded in 1895–1900; from Japanese: literally, “buckwheat, buckwheat noodle”

Example Sentences

Take a break from the 14 beginner-friendly, mostly gentle trails with a steaming bowl of buckwheat soba at Chouji-An, then hit the slopes for a few more hours.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 24, 2026

The amount is equivalent to more than 6,000 orders of his most popular dish: soba with mixed vegetables and seafood tempura, which costs just over $3.

From New York Times • Jun. 7, 2024

Examples of food provided in the breast cancer clinical trial included peanut soba noodles, steel cut oatmeal, banana flax muffins, sweet potato enchiladas, and Mediterranean white bean soup.

From Science Daily • May 22, 2024

When shopping, look for non-instant dried ramen, sometimes called chukamen or chuka soba; the noodles may be straight or curly.

From Washington Times • Aug. 18, 2023

When all is finished, even to the final purification by beating everything in the house with a fresh bamboo, games and festivities and soba are in order.

From Japanese Girls and Women Revised and Enlarged Edition by Bacon, Alice Mabel