Ramen Noodles: those wonderfully cheap packages of noodles shaped like a brick which requires superhuman strength to break apart. Whether you prefer the classic chicken, seasoned beef or veggie surprise, all the flavor comes out of a small package of seasoning. Of course, expecting high quality from a $.50 package of noodles sounds a bit crazy. If you were to buy actual pasta noodles, however, you would be deprived of the “seasoning.” So, Ramen wins out.
Most college students find themselves depending on Ramen at one point or another in their college experience. You could say Ramen is a college student’s bread and butter, mostly because bread and butter are way too expensive for college students to eat on a regular basis.
When bread, butter and mac-and-cheese is still too expensive, you know you are facing a college student struggle. Basically, Ramen and mac and cheese are one and the same: both have some form of pasta and powdery substance – mac and cheese just requires other resources, like butter and milk.
So, if you cannot afford mac and cheese, or just want to spice up your dinner of Ramen, here are three cheap ways to improve Ramen Noodles.
1. Italian flavor.
This recipe is pretty cheap: in fact, it should only cost $4 or so, but the ingredients will last through an entire box of Ramen so the expense is worth it. All you need (besides other items that can be added for more flavor) is Italian dressing and a few peppers (yellow and orange are the mildest and generally work the best in this dish). Cook the pasta like normal, chop up the peppers, add the peppers and the Italian dressing to the Ramen, and you are left with a much tastier dish!
2. Chicken ranch flavor.
This second recipe is a bit more expensive as it requires meat, but, again, the outcome is worth the price. With frozen chicken, the cost will be around $4; fresh chicken might bump the price up to $7 or $8. Instead of buying fresh chicken, you can substitute a frozen bag of breaded chicken since it will last longer. Then, all that is left to buy is the ranch dressing. Cook the chicken (obviously, eating raw meat is a really bad idea), chop it up into bite-size pieces and put both it and the ranch in the bowl with the cooked Ramen.
3. Veggie flavor.
This recipe is my favorite (and possibly the most expensive depending on which vegetables you use). Simply go to the store and buy whatever vegetables sound good, either fresh or frozen, and heat them up (or leave raw) and place in the bowl with cooked Ramen. If you want to add more flavor, pour some olive oil dressing over the vegetables after cooking.
There are tons of other recipes for Ramen Noodles floating around on the Internet, and most of them are worth trying at least once. After using a few of these tasty ways to spice up pre-packaged noodles, you will never have to dread eating Ramen again. Well, okay…maybe you still are not thrilled to eat them, but at least there are ways to make them taste better!
Photo Credit: Cover, Image 1.