Today I Learned (TIL)

Yes you must try all the phases of ramen to become a true expert:

• Bone dry: I recommend about 60% of a spice packet on this one unless you are feeling spicy!
• Wet but strained: put the noodles in the water and strain them, then put the spice packet in and mix
• soup: you probably do this already. But consider dropping an egg in and mixing it. Or add veggies/green onions/ leftover chicken.

Taste aside, why wouldn't it be safe to eat? Same goes for canned food btw, and something like ravioli are actually pretty decent cold.

You are absolutely right. They are a great crunchy snack.

But they are not raw. The noodles are pre-fried. That's why they are ready so quickly and also what makes them quite unhealthy.

dry ramen is the cheapest snack money can buy. especially in Eastern Europe.

Kids here open the outer package carefully, take out the bag with the powders and oil, open them and pour them into the bag, and crunch the noodles with the ingredients. Then they eat them as snacks. My reaction when my kids told me about this was "WHAT!?!?".

I did this fairly often in my teen years. As a snack it's... okay, I guess?

Peanut butter and ramen sandwich!

My aunt used to make a ramen slaw that was amazing, using raw noodles.

I've done this with chicken flavoured instant noodles. They seem to taste better "raw".

There's also a kids snack that was (might still be) Mamee noodles when I was a kid. They're supposed to be a snack that was designed, I believe, to be eaten raw with the flavouring to be shaken in. At least that's what we used to do.

(This is in Australia)

Baby Star is the seasoned version of that snack

I eat ramen this way now and then. Started in college when I was saving up for a wedding ring. It’s a poor man’s Doritos. Just break up a ramen brick into a bowl, shake the seasoning on top, and add a drizzle of your favorite hot sauce.

My favorite ramen to do this with is beef flavor Maruchan. I actually like it better this way than boiled into a soup.

I have a friend who said they and their friends did this when they were kids. Seemed bonkers to me at the time, but even my partner recently told me she has eaten noodles this way.

Yeah.. Lived off of this in college. Thought it was a great main meal and snack.

I remember as kids, at some point my brother was just grabbing one of these before we went to school instead of making a lunch. It was a few years later by the time we were adults and I remarked how it must have been weird going into the teacher lounge to find a kettle or microwave or whatever when I learned, no, he'd open the bag and snack on it like a bag of chips.

...how else are you supposed to eat it?

But it SUCKS.