Sanuki Udon Noodles are perfect for satisfying your appetite if you are traveling with limited time. Udon is something like fast food. There are many Sanuki Udon Noodle shops near the tourist sites in Takamatsu, Kagawa.
Check their business hours and the days they are closed on their official websites or social media accounts before visiting them.

1　Udon Shop near Ritsurin Garden

Mensho Kusugami

Mensho Kusugami offers idiosyncratic menu items in Kagawa, the kingdom of udon, developing udon creatively to enable customers to enjoy their udon noodles from beginning to end.

They recommend the hormone no tsuke udon. The udon is served with a thick stock made of beef small intestines, cabbage, garlic chives and onsen tamago (soft-boiled egg). Dip the noodles in the stock first. Next, crack the egg and mix it into the noodles for a change (Ajihen in Japanese). After finishing the noodles, put rice into the bowl with the remaining stock. You can enjoy three different ways to eat the dish. They try to make their noodles easy for everyone, young and old, to eat. Their standard refined texture is comfortably smooth, soft and moist.

Saying that their udon is complete when the customer finishes it, the shop owner works to provide a stable, consistent flavor, even when the weather changes. All the employees enjoy working at Mensho Kusugami, regardless of any disabilities they may have. The three circles of the logo mark represent the connection between the shop, the community and welfare.

Men-ya Shichifuku

The shop curtain bears a smiling Ebisu, the god that eats udon. They want their customers to smile like Ebisu.

They recommend the Ebisu bukkake udon. It is topped with a generous amount of ingredients — sweet and salty beef and pork, onsen tamago and deep-fried tofu. The toppings almost hide the noodles. The richly flavored yolk of the egg goes perfectly with the meat. They use eggs laid by olive-fed hens.

The shop owner always takes extra care when selecting ingredients and goes through the whole process. They remove the heads and guts from small dried sardines from Ibukijima, Kagawa when preparing the stock to create its clean taste. Then, two kinds of soy sauce are blended for an ideal taste.
Fat is removed from the meat to reduce its greasiness. They produce smooth springy noodles by letting the dough sit overnight before kneading (called Yoineri method). You will be tempted to come to their shop every day because of the inexpensive prices.

Teuchi Udon Kokoro

Their specialty, kori kamaage udon, enables you to enjoy both kamaage udon and zaru udon at the same time.

They serve freshly boiled very hot noodles on ice together with two soups, a hot one and a cold one. First, dip the noodles in the hot soup to enjoy it as kamaage udon as soon as it is served. Second, mix the noodles with the ice to tighten the texture of the noodles. Eat the noodles without any seasonings to enjoy their pure taste. You will detect the slight saltiness of the natural salt and the sweetness of the minerals in the noodles. Last, dip the noodles in the cold soup. Take your time and enjoy them slowly. The scent of yuzu in the soups makes the taste of the noodles even better. 

They make the noodles by blending three kinds of wheat. It is so delicate that the texture will change if the blend is changed even a little. They repeatedly knead the noodles as they mature over four days to produce noodles that both have a body and are smooth. The noodles include natural salt so they have a slightly salty taste that is characteristically accompanied by the sweetness of minerals. Some customers have the noodles together with sake.

2　Udon Shop near Tamamo Park

Merikenya Takamatsu Ekimae

Merikenya Takamatsu Ekimae attracts many tourists at the end of their trips as well as local people because it is located a one-minute walk from Takamatsu Station.

They recommend the niku bukkake udon. They prepare noodles faithfully in accordance with the definition of authentic Sanuki Udon Noodles. The two-step maturation process generates a body and smoothness that you can feel when swallowing. The noodles are topped with lots of sweet and salty beef. You will not stop eating because it has the perfect combination of a strong soup and grated Japanese radish.

As a side dish, they offer tempura made from seasonal ingredients such as laver and shitake from Kagawa and pike conger from the Seto Inland Sea. They want customers from other prefectures and countries to know more about the culture of Shikoku through food.

Sanuki Teuchi Ajisho

Ajisho is just south of the Takamatsu Station highway bus terminal. Opening very early, the shop attracts people who will ride buses or trains, people who have just arrived and commuters. The aroma of the soup using a small dried sardine stock tempts you to drop in.

They recommend hiyashi udon, which is served cold. Asserting that the best way to make noodles is kneading them by hand, they start to prepare the noodles for the day at two in the morning. You will feel at home, tasting the hand-kneaded noodled and the stock based on dried sardines with a gentle sweetness. It is something like the soups they make at home in Sanuki.

The menu lists traditional items. Tempura is neatly placed on aluminum trays. Everything in the shop looks rustic and nostalgic. The comfy shop is charming enough to make you come back.

Kamaage Udon Okajima Takamatsu

True to their name, kamaage udon is their top recommendation.

The shop owner says that the deliciousness of udon lies in its texture and the flavor of the wheat. The base of their noodle is Sanuki no Yume, a wheat grown in Kagawa. They pay full attention to temperature management and freshness in the process from making the dough to boiling the noodles to preserve its characteristics. The boiled noodles feel springy. You will feel the scent of the wheat in your nose.

They prepare a special kamaage udon soup, making the stock with kelp from Hokkaido, small dried sardines from Ibukijima, Kagawa and shitake and adding small dried and powdered sardines at the end to enhance its flavor.
The bowls for Kamaage Udon are specially manufactured Tobe ware pottery. The bowls keep the udon warm until it is finished because of their heat-insulating properties.

The walls are decorated with charming Japanese folk crafts that entertain customers including those from other countries.

3　Udon Shop at Aji, Yashima

Oudon Setobare

They are so popular that all of the seats are taken as soon as the shop opens at nine. When you step into the shop, you will hear the rhythmic sound of someone cutting noodles with a knife and the vibrant voice of the shop owner welcoming customers.

The name of the shop comes from the shop owner's wish to make customers feel cheerful like a sunny day on the Seto Inland Sea when they eat udon.

They recommend kijoyu udon. The sleek-looking noodles are neatly placed in a bowl, forming a C shape. They make the noodles in the morning (known as the Asaneri method), believing that moist noodles are the ideal of what noodles should be. They fine-tune the mix according to the season, using Chikugo Izumi, a wheat produced in Kyushu, as the main ingredient. They use more water than usual to make the noodles glossy and pleasant feeling in the throat. They are one of the greatest udon shops that make you want to come back.

Zaigo Udon Honke Waraya

Zaigo Udon Honke Waraya is in a house with an impressive thatched roof that you may associate with old Japanese tales.

Specializing in kamaage udon, of course that is their recommendation. They serve soup from a big sake bottle. It is one of Waraya's specialties. Pour warm soup into a bowl and smell its soft aroma.

The soup is based on a good amount of small dried sardines from Kagawa, kelp from Hokkaido and dried bonito made in Japan. They boast a flavor whose secret has been passed down since the shop was founded. They boil noodles in anticipation of the number of customers that will come to serve freshly boiled noodles in a timely manner.
The Japanese name of the shop includes the term zaigo, which in the regional dialect means staying in the countryside. The wooden frame of the house is also charming. You can fully enjoy your stay in the countryside at the shop.

Udon Honjin Yamadaya Sanuki Main Branch

Kagawa-born designer Kunibo Wada (1899-1992) created this shop from planning the interior design to the selection of menu items. The shop uses a merchant's house that used to be a sake brewery.

Kama Bukkake is the most popular item. Take the noodles directly from the pot and scatter (bukkake in Japanese) toppings and soup over the noodles. It is a dynamic yet proper way to eat bukkake udon. Bukkake became popular after it was featured on a nationwide TV show.

Yamadaya has transformed udon by discovering new ingredients every day while preserving its traditional flavor. To make noodles, they use wheat specially produced in Kyushu for Yamadaya, which they selected after repeated experiments with many different varieties of wheat. Their noodles only use the good-quality parts of the wheat. They boil the noodles and wash them with water for kake udon and zaru udon. For kamaage udon, they serve freshly boiled noodles without washing them. That is why you can enjoy their unique springy but soft texture.

Enjoy the work of Kunibo Wada alongside the Udon.