Help! I need to find some foodstuffs that I can keep in my desk to prepare when I miss lunch. I need meals that will survive at room temperature and can be prepared by heating in a microwave or adding hot water, which I imagine limits me to cans and freeze-dried goods. What are your favorite instant yummies? I have access to a fair number of exotic food makets here that cater to recent imigrants, so I can find fairly obscure things.
Some of the Campbell’s soups are nice in microwaveable containers are nice.
Lipton has some good shelf-stable pasta dishes. Make sure you use the right amount of water, and they’re all pretty good (too little = gluey goop).
Our supermarket has some shelf-stable Thai dishes, mostly noodles. My favorite are noodles with spring onions: the brand I like (whose name slips my mind – it’s in a red box with a black square logo) had separate packets for the hot oil and the seasonings and is quite good.
Just remembered: the brand is Thai Kitchen.
Fantastic Foods has excellent soups, noodles, and cereals in a cup–just add hot water. They’re lower in sodium than most other soup-bowl-type products, and there are lots of different kinds, so you can eat them every day and not get bored. (Not that I did that for about three years of graduate school, or anything. cough) They’re usually found with the “natural foods.”
Oh, and Nile Spice is another good brand for soup cups. Also usually found in the natural foods aisle.
Does it have to be heat-‘n’-eat? Granola bars make a fine, filling snack.
JELL-O® PUDDING!
PUDDING PUDDING PUDDING!!1!!
I was going to suggest Fantastic Foods also. And I keep a box of instant oatmeal in my desk, too–but I eat that for breakfast.
If you have access to a fridge, here’s what I now do: I buy items for sandwiches and salads and just leave it in there. At lunch time I make the sandwiches, for my husband and I (we work together). It’s so much easier than making them at home ahead of time!
The Spice Hunter makes pretty decent mashed potatoes in a cup. I keep those in my desk at work, along with the Campbell’s soup at hand stuff.
I’m very ashamed to admit that I love Quaker Butter-flavored Instant Grits…
Tuna or peanutbutter. Actually tuna and peanutbutter. (but not together at once.)
I like plain tuna, but you also get the flavored/sauced up kinda for a little more.
I like eating chili right out the can, without even heating it. I even like the store brands (Albertsons, Publix, Winn-Dixie in my area).
I was going to suggest oatmeal as well. Cream of Wheat also makes instant one-serving packets that are pretty good.
I keep tuna and crackers in my desk drawer for lunches. I have a company fridge to keep mayo but if I didn’t I’d bring the little packets. Anyway, it’s a cheap and easy lunch.
I did the cup of soup thing for years but got totally sick of them. And the tuna is a lot more filling than soup.
Chicken chow mein by nissin foods . Has a spice& vegetable packet and a teriyaki sauce packet. Comes in a square container with a lid. Very easy, very good for an instant lunch. Just add water, 3 min on High, take it out, stir it , put it back in for 3 more min.Done
Pop Tarts, granola bars, just about any kind of cracker in a box.
Why be ashamed? I love grits, myself, and came into this thread to suggest them.
I also go for that instant flavored oatmeal. Apple Cinammon … mmmm.
I do the same with Chef Boyardee products (or store-brand knock-offs, even).
I mistakenly recommended Jell-O Instant Pudding before fully reading the OP. Since Emilio’s requirements involve preparability with only hot water and a microwave, instant pudding (which requires milk, beating, and chilling) is not advisable. Yummy though it may be.
I therefore regretfully withdraw the suggestion.