So, I’m sitting here looking around the kitchen pondering dinner, and I wonder to myself, “what can I do with a package of Top Ramen to make it more interesting?”
So I have white, balsamic and rice vinegars, soy sauce, vegetable, olive, peanut and sesame oils, assorted spices, herbs and other seasonings, tuna, green beans, corn and black olives(both whole and sliced), cheddar and colby jack cheese, a kielbasa, and some hamburger, couple of steaks, and some chicken legs I could thaw if need be.
I’m sort of stuck. I know I should be able to whip up something, well edible, and interesting out of that, but my brain isn’t cooperating.
Any suggestions?
Sounds like the makings of a decent ramen. Tuna in a can? Skip that. Cook up the noodles, omit the seasoning packet. Thaw those chicken legs and poach them. Make up a broth of the poaching water and some rice vin, soy, and sesame oil. Fresh green beans? toss them in towards the end and a handful of corn. Or maybe cook the steaks rare and thinly slice over the top? Got an egg? soft boil. slice in half. Put the noodles in a bowl, add broth, add veggies, add protein, add eggs, a little sesame oil, maybe some hot sauce. Crush up some peanuts, toss over the top.
An alternate treatment, open ramen, cook in water until slightly underdone without seasoning packet (but reserve packet since depending on the ‘flavor’ of the ramen packet, you can use it as an emergency replacement for canned shrimp/beef/chicken broth in these benighted times), drain noodles, set aside. Marinate steak briefly (say 30 minutes in a couple of Tablespoons of soy sauce and rice wine vinegar plus spices (salt, sichuan pepper if you have it, ginger and garlic) with a 1/2 teaspoon of cornstarch as a thickener. Cook steak to medium rare/medium. Briefly stir fry green beans in sesame oil, then add the noodles, and cook on high heat briefly. Thin slice the steak and serve on top of the noodles and green beans.
I’d top with toasted sesame seeds and red pepper flake, again if you have them.
A friend makes a quickie version of Pho using top ramen as the base. She calls it “Faux Pho”.
Do you have any hoisin sauce?
I do not have any hoisin sauce…
runs off to google hoisin sauce
Trust me, you want Hoisin sauce, I recommend Soy Vey Garlic Hoisin.
It works for almost any sweet and pungent Pan-Asian sauce base, as a BBQ sauce, and thinned with a bit of rice wine vinegar, an all-purpose dipping sauce. I use it to kick up my fried rice, to add flavor to homemade dumplings, and as a key ingredient for Char Siu. A vaguely similar flavor profile can be found if you use Oyster Sauce, but some people object to the fishy (well, oystery) overtones.
In that case, you’d better google holy basil, too!
I’ll probably have to order that (the basil) unless the local co-op happens to carry it. I think I can get lemon basil readily enough, I’ve seen it here and there, but I don’t think that’s the basil you mean. Hoisin sauce sounds interesting also.
Yep, holy basil (thai basil) is different. I just glanced online at hoisin sauce “recipes” and they all seem to use peanut butter, which is very wrong. I suppose it could taste good, but it’s not hoisin sauce. At least hoisin is usually easy to find in a regular supermarket.