Please welcome guest poster Hans ‘The Ramen Rater‘ Lienesch, who shares one of my greatest passions; Instant noodles! Hans and I are both fans of Ramen and other varieties of packaged convenience noodles, and he’s agreed to share one of his favorites here. Please give a warm welcome to another noodle fanatic.
Take it away Hans!
Since I was a small child, I have enjoyed instant noodles. I started out with what every other kid in the USA has – Top Ramen. Then, they came out with something called Roasted Ramen, noodles that already had the seasoning within them – no packet!
These were off the market soon though and that’s when everything changed in my instant noodle world. My parents took me south to Seattle and we went to a big Japanese grocery in the heart of the International District. As it turned out, the Roasted Ramen I so enjoyed actually was how they marketed Chikin ramen – Nissin’s first instant noodle in 1958, of which they had a great quantity.
What I noticed (I was about 12 years old) was that there were a ton of different varieties of instant noodles to be had there; with different colored packaging and strange foreign writing I couldn’t begin to understand.
My folks let me sample a few and it was fun – some were almost impossible to cook; what were the instructions saying?
Over 30 years later and having officially sampled over 650 different unique varieties, I have found that there’s one brand that I must say is my favorite. They’re not from Japan, and it’s not soupy.
The brand is Indomie and their product, Mie Keriting Rasa Ayam Panggang (Special Quality Curly Noodles With Grilled Chicken Flavor) is the variety.
So what’s the deal? Why is it so good? Well, It’s got some great noodles, a smorgasbord of seasonings and garnishes within the package and I’ve come up with a lot of different additions one can make to really round things out. Here’s how I make it. What’s more, if you have absolutely no way to pick up this particular brand, any brand will do fine as far as the additions go (just drain off all but a trickle of the broth).
The Ramen Rater’s Indonesian Number One Noodles
Ingredients:
- A pack of Indomie Special Quality Curly Noodles With Grilled Chicken Flavor (or any other brand as long as you drain off all but a few tablespoons of broth)
- Kizami Shoga (pickled Ginger – the bright pink sharp kind)
- Fried shallot (fresh or dry)
- 2 Eggs
- Huy Fong Sriracha Sauce (aka Red Rooster or Cock Sauce)
- A little chicken or turkey sliced lunch meat
- Seasoning salt
The first thing you need to do is open the package of noodles. You’ll find a daunting array of packets. No worries – this is where the fun begins! The single packet on the right is a small packet of chicken flavored soup base. Set it aside – we’ll use this later. The top packet has a combo of Manis Pedas (sweet hot chili sauce) and seasoned oil. Below that is a dual packet containing powdered seasoning and veggies.
Now is a good time to fry up some eggs. Make sure the yolks don’t get solidified – runny yolks are essential.
Get a pan full of water boiling. You’ll want to put the noodle block and the veggies in there for about three minutes.
All of the remaining ingredients (except the small single packet) need to be in a bowl as you see above. Once the noodles are cooked, drain them well and put them in the bowl and mix well. Put the eggs on top of the noodles.
Pour the little packet into a cup and add a little boiling water and stir well. You can add as little as 1/8th cup to 1/4 cup, depending on your tastes. The trick now is to pop the yolks gently so they start to leak. Pour the broth over them slowly – this creates a really rich and flavorful small amount of broth
which makes everything sing.
This is when I usually add a liberal amount of pickled ginger as well as fried shallot. A blog reader sent me a small bag of fresh shallots recently and I found home-fried shallots to be a delicacy worth going the extra mile to make. Other fine things to add are garlic, onion, leeks, anything you think would taste nice probably will. I usually add a pinch of seasoning salt at this point.
I added some turkey this time and a little Sriracha sauce all around. Voila! All done. You can add more or less of what you like. This is my general recipe to make instant noodles come alive. The Indomie is wonderful stuff; this makes for a very good breakfast that I’ve enjoyed for years. As I said above, you can use any other instant noodle you want – I would say that strong seafood varieties be avoided as the eggs don’t always jibe well nor do the additions of chicken or turkey. Shrimp, chicken, beef and pork as well as Oriental flavored instant noodles do quite well in this configuration. Dig in and enjoy!
You can find other articles by Hans here:
Hans ‘The Ramen Rater’ Lienesch
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