The Flexibility of Ramen

When your pots are dirty, a frying pan will work in a pinch. I ended up making this more of a stir fry than soup. Great for clearing out leftovers. Almost done with the New Year's leftovers.

Also, I'm slowly working through all the unfinished posts in my drafts folder. Most I'm sure I will have no idea why I wanted to post it, but whatever... improvise.

Lotus Foods Jade Pearl Rice Ramen

The Blogger app on my new phone is a little glitchy, and my post... gone.

One of the things I'm missing most since going "gluten lite" are those instant ramen packs. Yeah, yeah, yeah I've heard how bad they are for you. But man, oh man... they cooked up quick and hit the spot. And of course before deciding to lay off the gluten I bought a bunch of ramen. Well thankfully I have a cousin living nearby and I'm sure she will appreciate the donation.

I was shopping in Honest Weight a few days ago when I spotted a new item. Gluten free ramen from Lotus Foods. They had three varieties to choose from - Forbidden Rice, Millet & Brown Rice, and Jade Pearl. The Jade Pearl noodles that I cooked up are as the package states "infused with chlorophyll-rich wild-crafted bamboo extract," and has a "delicious light vanilla taste." Hmm. 

Anticipating the miso soup would be on the bland side, I cut back on the water hoping for more flavor. Nope. Pretty bland. A dash of soy made it better but you're better off just buying the noodles separately and using your own better broth. The noodles were okay. Didn't catch that vanilla taste, but they cooked up fine and didn't clump (which I've found happens to rice noodles from time to time). I may tinker around with them and try using it for pancit or palabok. 

 

Spiffy Ramen

I went to Mitsuwa and didn’t order any ramen from the food court. Obviously because of the no meat thing, but also because I went there during one of their crowd packing festivals, and the line for the ramen was out the door. And I didn’t have cash on me. But they had instant ramen on sale in the market – 5 packs for $2.99! Almost unheard of this brand, which of course I can’t tell you because it’s in Japanese and my Japanese is pretty rusty.

I should have bought more… bah! Anyways, I made M and myself a nice vegetarian version. Used the miso flavored packs and boiled some eggs while I picked over what vegetables were left in the fridge. I settled on pea shoots from my weekly vegetable share and chopped scallions. Simple. The ramen came with not only the soup base, but a topping as well. For the miso it’s the red pepper which I love. I added more to my soup from my own supply.

Ah… so good. Good enough for me to borrow from the library “Ramen to the Rescue.” Love e-books – will never have a late fee again.

Ramen Combo

 

My grandparents went back to the Philippines for a nice long holiday and I offered to drive them to the airport. On the way back I decided to stop by Mitsuwa for some lunch.

I ordered the small miso ramen set. Everything was great, as usual. And even though I wanted to pick some things up in the grocery store, I refrained and just got some Hoji soft serve.

Ramen No More

I was looking forward to eating at Ramen Setagaya. Now it looks like I've lost my chance. Eater reports that the restaurant has been shut down by the Department of Health.

Eek. Do I want to know what codes they violated?

Maybe I should just stick to Mitsuwa.