Plump Osaka wheat udon in a light dashi-soy broth, topped with sweet soy-simmered sliced beef and spring onion. The standing-soba-and-udon shop staple of central Osaka.
Dotonbori Imai opened in 1946 in the bombed-out theatre district as an udon-suki house and helped define Osaka's lighter dashi-led udon broth, distinct from the soy-darker Tokyo style. Niku-udon, the beef variant introduced when sugared sliced beef became a workers' lunch in the 1950s, is now standard across every Osaka udon shop.
2 editor picks for Niku-udon (beef udon) in Osaka, ranked by editorial score. All Osaka signature dishes · Niku-udon (beef udon) across every city.
Matsuba Sohonten ★ 4.6
Umeda and Kita · 9-20 Kakudacho, Kita-ku, Osaka 530-0017
A standing kushikatsu counter inside Shin-Umeda Shokudogai postwar food alley; from ¥100 per skewer, busy at lunch and after work with office workers.
Dotonbori Imai Honten ★ 4.0
Dotonbori and Namba · 1-7-22 Dotonbori, Chuo-ku, Osaka 542-0071
One of Dotonbori's oldest udon restaurants; the kitsune udon recipe has been unchanged since the 1940s; dashi is simmered in a 70-year-old clay pot.