Ramen: My Teacher

My journey started off before I could remember. We all know the instant ramen packages. The shiny plastic holding the block of curly noodles and sauce packet. A college kid essential, and financially safe option. I’ve grown up with this food, first named by me and my brother as “daddy noodles” as my father still eats some weekly. You bowl the noodles for 3 minutes, add the sauce packet and enjoy your delicious, warm, and filling soup that takes zero effort to make. The flavor and texture of the noodles are forever ingrained in my being.

Ramen was the first food I ever cooked as a kid, helping myself to a bowl when my parents were too busy to make a meal. It was my first sign of independence, and over time, the beginning of my cooking journey. It started plain, then you add the egg. This was a favorite of my mom and dad. Shortly after you have the noodles in you add in a whole un-beaten egg. You take it off the heat and let the egg whites cook, and you’re left with a delicious poached egg. You break the yolk and the uncooked yolk spills into the broth, thickening the soup and adding a great hearty flavor. Next, you can add meats, different poached vegetables, kimchi, you name it! It’s the greatest customizable meal you can make. My mom and my’s favorite way to make it is with mackerel, kimchi, and egg, but you use half the water, and get a really concentrated and flavorful broth that you eat over rice. Extremely stinky food but such great wintertime treat for my family. But this dish served as my introduction to cooking, teaching me essential techniques for amateur cheffs to learn, especially when strapped for time. Depending on how you customize your ramen, you can learn essential chopping and knife skills, pan frying skills if you’re cooking meat beforehand, and get a reference for different flavors and pallets that you add to it.

As I’ve gone into college, I’ve become quite the cook for myself, making myself my own dinners daily, something that has surprised me as something not a lot of my colleagues do. Most people I’m friends with enjoy their takeout or frozen food and don’t pay too much time to the food they make at home. But over the past few months, I have been cooking for larger and larger groups, at most about 15 people. Cooking for a lot of people is really tough but I enjoy the work and how it brings people together to socialize. But I’ve also realized that a lot of people don’t know how to cook and I always tell them, cook ramen. It’s extremely simple, at its core you just boil water, but the way you make it your own will help familiarize yourself with the kitchen and the ingredients you have at your disposal. There is also a plethora of different recipes you can try.