Survival Sunday 13

It's been a while since I did a ramen recipe! We recently received another Umai crate, and since we'd just lugged the thing across town (it's delivered to my house where someone can bring it inside more quickly and easily, Z lives a ways away), we decided we deserved a really good meal.

Our choices were many - they're not joking around with what they put in those boxes - but we eventually set on a pack of really good miso ramen that we could prepare on the stovetop. It was two servings-worth, so that meant that we could have a huge bowlful and share it!

So, I didn't have the space to pop everything together in one shot, so I'll just list everything I used here:

Ingredients:
Noodles & Miso broth packs
Frozen Corn
Two Eggs
Green Onions
Seaweed Snacks (they're little sheets of dried, seasoned seaweed, very yummy)
Sesame Seeds
Pepper

Here's how we assembled this overstuffed bowl of delicious miso ramen!

1) I had Z help me set out all the ingredients in small bowls so we could chuck stuff in the water as it boiled. Z's job is to be my prep-chef because it's awesome to cook together and that way, if Z needs, say, a spoonful of peanut butter, it's easy to get :P

This time, I had Z use my "magical murder shears" to snip up the green onions because it's easier than a knife. They're not a necessity for a kitchen, but they do make life much easier. Do not use the same shears for cutting food up that you use on, say, wrappers or plastic. Not only will the blades dull faster, you'll risk contaminating your food with whatever was on that packaging or what have you.

Plain ol' frozen corn is great in miso ramen.
The sweetness balances the earthy tang of the miso.

This awesome ramen pepper was provided by Umai crate in one of our previous boxes.
It's amazing, and when we run out, I'm probably going to cry.
The heat it puts out is warm, but not overwhelming, yet it fills the whole mouth!

Any sesame seeds will do.
Z picked these up after work once.

We were using sushi-wrap nori at first.
We've since found that the precut rectangles you can buy as snacks are awesome for ramen.

These eggs had the hardest shells I've ever encountered.
I maybe let them go too long, as you'll see later, to make sure they didn't do anything weird.

Z here is demonstrating save cutting by keeping the blades away from the fingers.
Cutting scallions/green onions is much faster with shears.

The lovely green onions when Z was finished.

The magical murder shears.
I call them that because they look like a murder weapon.
And also because "magical murder" blank is a fun way to identify things.

The noodles & packets are so fancy in Japan!

2) Boil water! I didn't read the packaging clearly enough, so I started with the single-serving amount of water. Read your packaging clearly so that you don't take an hour to make stove-top ramen. Once your water is boiled, you are going to want to crack your eggs in. I hold my yolks in a ladle so it's easier to remove them once they're set enough for us!

I used 500ml instead of 900ml at first, so after the eggs,
I had to add 400ml more and that really dragged out the cooking time!

You do not have to cradle your yolks if you don't want to.
There are infinite ways to prepare eggs in ramen.
This is my way. Feel free to do it this way, though!

I didn't yet know that I was taking a little too much time with these yolks.
They were pretty set when we got them to the table.
That's okay, though, because I find it hard to trust Wal-Mart eggs...

3) Once your eggs are done, keep them in a bowl, covered, so that they stay warm. If you haven't cooked them quite long enough, this may help them set. It may also overcook them, so absolutely don't flub on the water or they'll sit in there for an hour while you try to get the water back to a boil!

Eggs covered, you're going to want to start adding your corn and half your green onion - this gives a nice texture and flavor to the veggies!

As soon as that water's back to a boil, though, you're going to toss your noodles in. Don't forget to take the little rings off of the noodles if you've got them - they're not a welcome addition to the soup! Other than that, I just leave the noodles alone and quickly ladle water over the parts that inevitably stick out of the water at first. Once they've wilted into the water, it's just a matter of watching the clock. Three minutes later, you're done!

This is when I also added some of that ramen pepper!
We added more at the table, of course, but it's fun to season the water a bit to start with.
Also, this smelled amazing and we hadn't even added the miso yet!

4) After your noodles are cooked, take them off the heat and add your flavor packs! We used both because my mother didn't raise a quitter. Okay, it's just because I really love the flavor that comes with these noodles. I swear, Umai crate does not sponsor me. It'd be awesome if they did, but they do not. I just love noodles.

It can be a bit fraught to get them from pot to bowl, especially when you realize too late that there's more in the pot than your big bowl can take! We ended up spooning about half of the broth into a smaller bowl and having that on the side. I didn't add more pepper or any sesame seeds to that broth and had Z beautify our communal bowl.

Words cannot describe how freaking good this broth is.

I think Z did a fantastic job - I've seen ramen from Japan that looks like this!

5) EAT YOUR NOODLES HOT, BABY!

Seriously, though, these are meant to be eaten while they're still hot, so dig in as soon as possible for maximum tastiness! That's a 20oz bottle of Coke to the side there, just to give you a sense of the scale of this monster bowl. We were stuffed by the time it was all gone.

I don't want to forget this, though!

While we were cooking, I heard a rustling noise from outside and looked out to see this:

I call him Buff Squirrel

I'm pretty sure this absolute beast was chewing on one of the corgis' marrow bones one time when I was coming in. He's huge. He scampered off as soon as I was done taking his picture, too!

So that's the recipe concluded.

I'm going to give our "spice" of the week to be sesame seeds, now.

Because they're great in almost every single Asian recipe you're going to cook. Seriously - they're tasty as heck, and as long as you're not allergic, they're a great way to add crunch, flavor, even oil to a recipe (you can buy sesame oil as well as sesame seeds. Do not fry with sesame oil, since not only is it a bit pricey, it also does not hold up too well to direct heat).

That's all from me for today!

Go Enjoy Something!
FC