Sunday, March 10, 2013

Help! My Ramen doesn't cook right!

Reader Justin thought his Ramen days were behind him.  He finished college two years ago, with a degree and got a great job in the business sector . . . only to get laid off last month.

Now he's back to Ramen and looking for a new job.

ramen


However, it's not the Ramen he remembers from college.

"It's soggy," he writes, "I remember a crunch."

The Ramen noodles haven't changed, Justin, you have.

A few back-and-forth e-mails established that.

First up, in college, he made them in the microwave.  Today?  He was trying to boil them on the stove.

The key to crunchy -- but cooked -- Ramen noodles is that they are never all the way submerged.  Your best bet is a 16 ounce, rectangle container.  You put one -- or two -- bags of Ramen noodles in that and fill with water.  Notice how the block of noodles floats?  That's okay.

You pop it into the microwave for six minutes.

You now drain.  If you add butter or a butter substitute, add it now.  Then add the spice from the spice packet.

And that's the noodles quick and fast -- the way you probably cooked it while rushing through college.

Good luck with the noodles and especially good luck with Thursday's job interview, Justin.