Hacking Ramen
Hacking Ramen: How to make healthy ramen noodle soup
Making ramen noodle soups is more about taste and convenience than it is about health and nutrition. But, what if you could have both? In this article I will hack a package of ramen by showing you how to make an easy organic broth that tastes just like the stuff from the powder packet, and I’ll add some actual green vegetables. I put this together in 5 minutes and so can you.
Before we continue, I want to quickly talk about the meaning of “healthy”. It seems everyone has a different definition for that word. For the sakes of this hack, “healthy” to me, means food with nutrients that your body can actually digest and turn into energy. So, what makes regular ramen noodle soups “unhealthy”? Well, they lack in any real protein, and they lack in any real vegetables (real vegetables have vitamins, minerals and enzymes). Also, the little powdered soup packets are mostly preservatives, which prevent your digestive system from absorbing any nutrients.
So, how did I make this soup into a healthy version in 5 minutes? Read on.
Ramen noodle soup is made up of three parts:
- The crispy, delicious ramen noodles. Don’t worry, I didn’t hack these. How could I? They’re perfect the way they are!
- The soup stock. Normally the stuff you mix with water and that little powder packet. This is where all the flavor is.
- The stuff you put into the soup. There are millions of things you could add to ramen. But normally, there is a little packet with dried stuff that floats around the bowl…
To make this soup into a healthy soup, you will need to do two things:
First, Toss that little soup packet into the garbage. And instead, make your soup stock by combining the following:
- 2 cups of water
- 1 tbsp of organic beef stock or chicken stock bouillon paste
- 1/2 tsp of sesame oil
- 1 tbsp of soy sauce
- 1 tiny pinch of white pepper (like 1/8th of a tsp)
Add your dried ramen noodles and bring to a boil.
Now, it’s time to add the nutritious stuff. I like to add this stuff, cold, into a big soup bowl, and then I will pour the hot soup over them, this warms the stuff, and cools the hot soup to a perfect temperature. For this recipe, I dug through my fridge and added the first green thing and protein that I found:
- Organic Lettuce
- Leftover Fried Chicken (in the bottom of the bowl)
- Garnishes with fresh, chopped scallions
I poured the hot soup and noodles into the bowl, and kazaa! Hot, healthy, ramen soup, that tastes just like junky ramen soup!
