Weekend Cooking...Ra Ra Ramen!

"Ramen is a Japanese noodle dish. It consists of Chinese style wheat noodle served in a meat- or (occasionally) fish-based broth often flavored with soy sauce or miso, and uses toppings such as sliced pork , dried seaweed, green onions, and occasionally corn." (Wikipedia)

I love ramen noodles. You know, the kind in those packs at the supermarkets, add to boiling water, add 'flavoring' pack.
They are quick and cheap and tasty and filling.
But, are some ramen better than others?
Is there a top quality ramen out there?

I can't say I ever really considered it until I saw an article picking the author's top ten ramen noodles. This guy has tested over 670 different ramen noodles!
OK, I never ever knew there were 670 different ramen noodles.
Actually, I am not sure I knew there were 10.
But there are!
And his number one pick is...drum roll...Indomie Special Fried Curly Noodles!

So, off I went to the internet to see if I could buy a pack. I could not find it, but I found a bunch of different flavors from the same company.
Soon I was the owner of a case.
A case of Indonesian ramen noodle packs.
But there are 6 different varieties in the case! And they have a very long expiration date.
Indomie BBQ Chicken, Onion Chicken, Regular, Spicy Beef, Satay, Rasa Soto Mie (Beef and Lime).
And they are all mine!

But what if you want to take it another step. Jazz them up a bit.
So I Googled ramen recipes and there are many. Many. There is a guy on YouTube who makes Ramen with peanut butter and BBQ sauce. Which is many not so odd since one flavor I now own is BBQ Chicken. But I have not tries that yet. I started with the Satay flavor.

Quite nice really, all by themselves, with a much more interesting pack of flavorings that the ordinary sort available at the supermarket, with that salty "chicken" or "beef" powder. But lets see what we can do with them as an easy, economical ingredient.  As usual, I took a bit from this recipe, a bit from that. I had bought these cute little bok choy, so in they went. Except for the mushroom and the ginger, I think I had everything else on hand. Love that bag of frozen shrimp, bought whenever they are on sale for a good price.
One pot..10 minutes..and you can have...several serving of...

Thai Shrimp Noodle Soup

cute baby bok choy..

• 1 tablespoon oil
• 2 cloves garlic, finely minced 
• 1 tablespoons peeled and very thinly slivered fresh ginger
• 1 cup sliced mushrooms
• 2 green onions, minced
• 1 carrots, thinly sliced
• 1 tablespoons fish sauce 
• 1/2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 1/2 tablespoon Thai hot chili sauce
• 3 cups boiling water
• 2 packages oriental- or chicken-flavor ramen noodles (I use 1 Satay  and 1 chicken onion flavor)
• 6 ounces medium-size shrimp, peeled and deveined
• 2 cups coarsely chopped fresh spinach 
• 1 cup chopped bok choy
• Juice and grated zest from 1 lime
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil

1. Heat oil in a soup pot. Add garlic and ginger, saute a minute, then add mushrooms, green onions, carrots and stir for another minute. 

2. Add three cups boiling water, ramen noodle seasoning packets, fish sauce and chili sauce to pot. Boil 4 minutes.

3. Add shrimp, spinach, boy choy and ramen noodles. Cook 3-5 more minutes, until noodles are done. Add lime juice, lime zest and basil. Stir well and serve.
I sprinkled my wee pack of included peanuts of top!

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This is my contribution this to this week's Weekend Cooking.
"Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend."
Be sure to check out the other entries this week. As always, hosted by Beth Fish Reads.

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