Do you love a cup of soup and instant ramen as much as we do? Here’s a DIY way to get your noodles fix while also upgrading it to be more delicious and packed with fresh ingredients.
Serious Eats’ J. Kenji López-Alt shows us it’s easier than you might think:
The idea is simple and genius: combine par-cooked noodles, a bit of vegetable base, some raw sliced veggies, and a few seasonings inside a jar. Add boiling water, wait a few minutes, and you’ve got yourself a lunch with all the appeal of instant noodles, but with actual flavour and freshness trapped under that lid.
We get all the benefits of instant noodles when it comes time to eat (convenience and portability), and we can also control exactly what goes into our lunches, avoiding too-salty or overly MSG-packed broth, and getting bigger bits of vegetables.
Kenji offers several examples to get you started (Spicy kimchi beef flavour instant noodles! Thai coconut curry shrimp flavour instant noodles!), but more important are his tips for making your own flavours.
Two tips stood out to me: Better Than Bouillon makes for a great soup base, and select specific noodles to make this work. Uncooked ramen or Italian pasta will come up mushy and gummy, but rice noodles, par-cooked noodles and no-cook noodle alternatives will do well. You can find these in Asian supermarkets. Alternatively, you can cook other noodles such as ramen until slightly underdone.
Check out the Serious Eats post for more details and ideas.
The Food Lab: Make Your Own Just-Add-Hot-Water Instant Noodles (and Make Your Coworkers Jealous) [Serious Eats]
Comments
5 responses to “Make Your Own Instant Noodle Cups For Healthier, Tastier Lunches”
That is actually a really cool idea, looks delicious. Would have been nice to have some Australian customisation for the article though – pretty sure Better Than Bouillon isn’t something that’s readily available here.
You can pick it up here for about $300 a kilo: http://www.fishpond.com.au/Health/Better-Than-Bouillon-Chicken-Base-240ml/0052000040722
Or use stock cubes
Maybe try Campbells stock paste?
http://www2.woolworthsonline.com.au/shop/ProductDetails?Stockcode=371870&name=campbells-real-beef-paste-stock
http://www2.woolworthsonline.com.au/shop/ProductDetails?Stockcode=371877&name=campbells-real-chicken-paste-stock-tube
What type of raw vegies?
RTFA
This is very clever!
Hugh on River Cottage did up a few of these a couple of months ago, and they looked awesome! If you get the chance, check out the episode (not sure what number), and he had some great recipes for those that want a little guidance in the first place before getting creative.