Ramen noodles are the college student's best friend -- they're cheap, filling and taste great. But what happens when you graduate from college and want to start making smarter, and even better-tasting choices?
The old college girl in me just can't get over the crush I used to have on the 33-cents-a-pop ramen noodle package. (Beef was my favorite flavor.) So now that my budget has grown and my waistline has shrunk, I still like to make room for ramen noodles in my kitchen.
Get the recipe for healthier ramen after the jump.
As a relatively recent convert to all things porcine, I'm positively in awe of this pork shot. Without even having any background info on the dish, one can immediately perceive the succulence of the pork, salivate at its melt-in-your-mouth talents and perhaps -- with a photo this enticing -- even hope for a seasoning that does justice to the tenderness of its vessel.
And norecipe.com's Japanese Chashu -- which indicates merely its component of barbecued or roasted pork -- is worthy of the perfection of its meat. Braised in a combination of soy sauce and miso, it undergoes a rather "unorthodox" approach, as Marc brings his version "full circle back to its Chinese roots, [adding] garlic, ginger, and white pepper, which give the meat some character without overwhelming its porky goodness." Prepared en masse, the pork is equally delicious atop a steamy bowl of ramen, pasta, salads and more.
For about 3.7 seconds today, I was asking myself if I have, perchance, been spending a tad too much time on Twitter lately. But, seeing as how said dallying then led to a deftly jazzed-up ramen recipe, courtesy of the author of one of my favorite food memoirs of the recent past, I don't see how any of us could afford not to. Kathleen Flinn is no stranger to the tireless, if sometimes penniless, pursuit of the delicious; The Sharper Your Knife The Less You Cry chronicles her loss of a lucrative corporate lifestyle and subsequent savings investment in a degree program at Le Cordon Bleu. While the the corner shops of Gay Paree may not have been chock-a-block with student budget-friendly ramen bricks, Flinn picked up a flavor trick or ten between puff pastry and boning lessons and shares her method for infusing the noodles with the brightness of miso, green onions, fresh herbs, Sriracha and citrus, as well as other light-wallet recipes.
Clearly, at-home ramen can be a reward rather than a last resort. How are you gussying them up, or are you hooked on the packet? Please share with the rest of the (broke...oh, so painfully broke) class, why don'tcha?
Brittany Murphy is the American noodle princess in the film The Ramen Girl. Media8entertainment gives a plot summary of the film explaining that it's about an American girl who gets dumped by her boyfriend and finds solace in her neighborhood ramen shop. She eventually persuades the Japanese chef to take her on as an apprentice. Brittany Murphy's character then decides it's her lifetime goal to become a ramen chef.
Josh Friedland of The Food Section states: "this might sound like a bizzarro "Saturday Night Live" skit (or just a bad dream). But, it's apparently for real, as this trailer for the film will attest." Serious Eats asserts that the film is Tampopo meets Lost in Translation. Tampopo is Juzo Itami's 1985 cult comedy that as Friedland describes is "a 'noodle Western' interspersed with a series of satirical vignettes about food culture."
The film is already playing in theaters in Japan. When will it come to the U.S.? I have to admit...I'm sort of dying to see it. Make sure to check out the trailer, which is embedded after the jump.
Anime, Japanese-style animation, has become increasingly popular over the years. I remember watching bootleg copies of Dragon Ball Z movies with my friends in high school. A couple years later I was delighted to see whole (albeit small) sections of anime at video stores like Suncoast. I was pleasantly surprised, and very amused, to find this list of the top eight foods in anime from Cosplay Classes.
1 Number one is ramen. I guess it's iconic to show characters slurping up the noodles. 2. Sushi, the quintessntial Japanese food. 3. Dessert is probably more prevalent in shows geared toward women. 4. Curry sure has made it's mark. 5. I had no idea pasta was so popular. 6. Apparently hamburgers are getting a lot of screen time. 7. The Japanese hot pot is a derivation of a Chinese dish. 8. Onigiri are simple to make and all kinds of anime characters put it in their bento boxes.
Ladies and gentlemen ... I've traveled over half of New York City's East Village slurping ramen noodles and broth. From Minca Ramen Factory to the city's first truly Japanese ramen-ya,Ramen Setagaya, to David Chang's self-professed "... crappy Pan-Asian ramen made for round-eyes," I have been on the front lines of New York City's so-called ramen wars. So ... ladies and gentlemen ... if I say I am a ramen man you will believe me.
As a ramen man I had been steadfastly waiting for the opening of the East Village outpost of Japan's Hakata Ippudo ever since reading about it on Rameniac. I longed to taste the much heralded soup of the Ramen King Shigemi Kawahara. Ladies and gentleman ... let me assure you it was worth the long wait for Ippudo NY to open. Upon my first visit I was so overcome by the springy noodles and the richness of the long-cooked pork-bone broth in the Shiromaru ramen that I was unable to take a photograph, lest I be separated from my first encounter with ramen ecstasy.
Too lazy to use a knife? Sick of switching back and forth from fork to spoon when you eat your Ramen noodles?
Ah, yes. These dining conundrums have befallen even the best of us at one time or another. The solution?
Enter, crazy new cutlery. The Washington Post's Jane Black reviewed a few new designs that promise to rid us of our dining woes (or, at the very least, provide us with fodder for our next dinner party conversation).
Among the new designs:
The "Knork," designed to serve as both knife and fork. A little awkward, but helpful for those parties where the you're perched in a corner, attempting to eat off of a tiny paper plate with just a fork.
Mono Zeug Tools are based on primitive Neanderthal designs, in that the knife is designed to be a piece of honed flint, and the spoon, a variation of a curved oyster shell.
Curvware is designed to be ergonomic so that you don't strain your hand or grip too hard when attempting to, say, cut your steak. Black pronounced it "very comfortable."
Ramen spoon - Admit it: Ramen noodles can be annoying to eat. This design changes all that, with a spoon for the broth and fork tines for those slippery noodles. And while I wouldn't go so far as to call it "genius," as Block does, it is pretty neat. Unfortunately, you'll have to wait 'til May before you buy it.
Check out the video of Black testing out these new tools here.
Last week I wrote about Rameniac, a guide to all things ramen so detailed and descriptive that it left me jonesing for a hot bowl of the stuff. As promised, I did indeed trek from my native Queens to Manhattan's East Village that same afternoon to satisfy my urge.
Rather than head to one of the neighborhood's longstanding ramenyas, I decided to try out Ramen Setagaya, a new spot that opened in mid-June amid much fanfare and accompanying long lines. Part of the reason for all the buzz surrounding Setagaya's opening lies in the fact that it's the first U.S. restaurant of a popular Tokyo chain. And a large part lies in the fact that they make one kickass bowl of soup.
Given my love of Japanese food, and my belief in the restorative powers of slurping down a steaming bowl of authentic ramen, I'm surprised that it took so long for me to happen upon Rameniac. I like to think of this site not as a resource but as the Rosetta Stone of ramen. Given that it lists 22 ramen styles ranging from the country's south all the way to Hokkaido all laid out on a map with links color-coded by soup base (miso, shoyu, shio, etc.), I don't think I'm exaggerating terribly much. There's also a section aptly titled "drooling" that reviews 15 ramenyas, some in Japan and some in the States. Add to that nine reviews of instant ramen, and all of sudden I'm craving a hot bowl of the stuff, even if it is practically August.
By the way the photo above is a bowl of shiromaru, or white sea ramen, from Hakata Ippudo, a chain with several locations in Japan as well as abroad. It's a pork bone soup with thin noodles, chopped green onion, luscious slices of pork and wood-ear mushrooms. This ramen is a specialty of Fukuoka. I have a sneaking suspicion that I'll be heading out to New York City's East Village for some soup in the very near future, as in the next 30 minutes.
The idea of slurping ramen in zero gravity makes me chuckle. I imagine strands of noodles floating around a space capsule while Strauss plays. Clearly that's not the image that the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) had in mind when it approved 29 foods for use in space earlier this week.
JAXA's spaceworthy menu includes instant ramen noodles, curry, onigiri rice balls, powdered green tea and mackerel in miso sauce. All of the products had to meet the stringent standards of the International Space Station, which include packaging capable of withstanding drastic changes in air pressure and temperature. JAXA hopes that astronaut Koichi Wakata, who will be stationed at the ISS starting in fall of 2008 will get to enjoy the new Japanese space cuisine. Too bad sake and natto did not make the menu.
Each of us hold in our hearts the secret crushes of our lives -- whether it's that barista who flashes you an adorable smile every morning with your nonfat soy decaf latte or an unrequited crush on some B-list celeb. I, however, am not so subtle, and proudly proclaim my utter adoration for Anthony Bourdain. I love the man.
So, I can't tell you how absolutely edamame-green with envy I was to read about LA foodblogger Dylan's encounter with the object of my affection. Dylan writes at Eat, Drink n Be Merry, and also has a food blog on the side dedicated to noodles called Noodle Whore. It was via a post about Sapp Coffee Shop in LA's Thai Town that Tony Bourdain found Dylan, and from there...the rest is jealousy-inducing history. Dylan got to meet Tony while the chef was in LA filming for an episode of his show, which included Sapp Coffee Shop.
If you live on either coast, or even in the Midwest in a major metropolitan area, you'll have no problem finding an Asian grocery store. Korean-specific markets are a little harder to find, and if you're somewhere where there isn't a huge population of Korean people, well, you might find yourself at a loss when a craving for kimchee strikes. You can make it yourself, or you can click over to koaMart, an online Korean food grocer.
Sure, they do the dry, non-perishable goods like ramen and rice, but they can send perishable goods like tofu and kimchee as well. I've never shopped at the store since I live in Los Angeles, but if I were in say, the mountains of Colorado (or really, really lazy) I might give them a try. Shipping isn't cheap, but hey, when you need your pickled, fermented cabbage, you gotta do what you gotta do.
You can't go shopping anywhere these days without being bombarded by "Back to School" sales. Even my local grocery store has "back to school" type foods, like peanut butter and bulk cases of instant ramen, highlighted all over the store. Yes, it's August, and school starts in a few short weeks.
"Back to school" is also in the news, and an article I came across this morning talks about what colleges are now doing to help students avoid the dreaded Freshman 15 - the 15 or so pounds that newly-away-from-home students gain because they're too busy studying to pay attention to what they're eating. Either that, or they're just indulging in pizza beer because they were never allowed to at home.
My freshman year in college, my weight gain was closer to a Freshman 20. Decked out in sweats and overalls about 90% of the time, I didn't really notice the weight gain until Spring. Twenty pounds crept up on me over two semesters at Cal from a simple daily diet of sugar-laden smoothies, Zona Rosa Burritos (I went to Cal), Top Dog, instant ramen, and study break "dates" during final exam fever eating pan-fried noodles drowning in starchy, sugary sauce at late night Chinese joints. But I know that if I had to blame it all one one thing, it would be Fat Slice Pizza.
I've confessed - 20 pounds of fat gained from Fat Slice Pizza. Now it's your turn. What was the real Freshman 15 for you? And how did you get there? "Free" dorm cafeteria food, laden with starch? $1.99 bacon, sausage, and eggs every morning before Econ 101? Beer? Candy? Spill it.
Forget about the so-called Italian spaghetti western. This time around, Food Movies We Love brings us to Tampopo, the world's first Japanese noodle western.
Written and directed by Juzo Itami, Tampopo tells the story of Goro (played by Tsutomu Yamazaki) a truck driver/guardian angel who comes to town to help widowed noodlemaker Tampopo (Nobuko Miyamoto) create the greatest fast-food noodle joint Japan has ever seen.
Equal parts Shane, The Seven Samurai and Big Night, Tampopo is a crossover hit. Whether you like art-house movies with subtitles or whether you like noodles, Tampopo is guaranteed to please.
The idea of slurping ramen in zero gravity makes me chuckle. I imagine strands of noodles floating around a space capsule while Strauss plays. Clearly that's not the image that the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) had in mind when it approved 29 foods for use in space earlier this week.
Each of us hold in our hearts the secret crushes of our lives -- whether it's that barista who flashes you an adorable smile every morning with your nonfat soy decaf latte or an unrequited crush on some B-list celeb. I, however, am not so subtle, and proudly proclaim 
If you live on either coast, or even in the Midwest in a major metropolitan area, you'll have no problem finding an 
You can't go shopping anywhere these days without being bombarded by "Back to School" sales. Even my local grocery store has "back to school" type foods, like peanut butter and 
Forget about the so-called Italian spaghetti western. This time around, Food Movies We Love brings us to 
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