Noodle Quest

What the fish!

noodleslurper — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 19:57:55 +0000

Perhaps our blog should be more about which noodles are safe to eat after they expire since we prolong our eating dates so much that the noodles we planned to eat have already expired. But, being the fearless warriors the cheap eaters we are, we decided to eat it. Anywho, yesterdays todays noodle was yet another udon noodle.

We were very skeptical about it and kept smelling both the noodle packet and the sauce packet to see if it was safe. It didn't really smell weird...then again how much of something can you smell through sealed plastic?

Regardless of the nonexistant smell that we were sure was there, Mima went and took the noodles out of the package. I believe they had to be rinsed a couple of times before she put the sauce on it.

Doesn't that look delectable? I was hesistant to take the first bite as it smelled very...fishy. Mima also was hesistant about trying it so we did rock paper scissors to see who would go first.

Look who lost . She says that the taste was the same as its smell, which was very fishy. By the way, this was NOT seafood udon.

Maybe we should consider brushing our hair before taking these pictures....Nah. I thought that the noodles were very good, but the soup flavor...not so much.

No pictures of our father here as he was sleeping. Sorry to all his fans who were looking forward to seeing him. Overall, this noodle receives a 2.25, a 2 from me and 2.5 from Mima. Not the best udon I’ve had, but it’s definitely not the worst. If you like fishy flavored stuff then this may just be the thing for you.

I would also like to add that this is my last and final post. It was fun while it lasted.

Trader Joe? Trader No!!

fairnoodle — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 05:31:42 +0000

On a whim I saw these Sesame Soba Noodles at Trader Joes and I thought we would give them a shot for the noodle quest. Many of the items sold at Trader Joes are actually pretty tasty including their meatless products. So with some anticipation I bought two Sesame Soba Noodles and brought them home.

Sesame Soba Noodles from Trader Joe San. They are frozen

The frozen noodles actually looked pretty appetizing. There were veggies arranged nicely on top. I was beginning to think I had really delivered in the noodle quest. I called the girls up and we went to work preparing the noodles. Two minutes in the microwave till noodle perfection!

The microwave does its magic transforming the noodles into ...

Two minutes later … I think a picture will tell the story better.

Gray matter, mushy, unappetizing, how could two minutes in a microwave transform it into this?

Wow! It really looked gross and when I mixed the noodles together, the gray matter turned grayer. You couldn’t tell where the noodles stopped and the veggies began. Worse yet the noodles had been pre-chopped to 1 1/2 inch lengths. Why would you do that? Did TJ’s hire a noodle consultant that told them to chop noodles? Maybe they took a cue from Spaghetti O’s.

They say that the truth is in the tasting. Being the generous father that I am, I let Aisha go first. She took a bite and quickly headed to the trash can to spit it out (sorry no pictures of that). Amira managed to swallow hers. My bite confirmed that the taste matched how it looked. This was the Poi of noodles, mushy mushy mushy with a bland taste to match.

Sometimes you need to experience something really bad to realize how good things can be. The Trader Joes Sesame Soba Noodles created a new standard for bad and has given mediocre noodles a new lease on life. If you aren’t appreciating life I suggest you go down and eat some Sesame Soba Noodles to change your perspective.

The Fox’s Udon

Mima — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 17:29:19 +0000

What is this? Another post?! Le gasp! Yes, we are going to hopefully start posting again….Posting on a regular basis that is. I’ll make sure of it because I refuse to let this die! >:T At the time that we had eaten this soup, our dad was in London.

So, in this post my sister and I alone had a taste of a fox’s favorite soup; Kitsune Udon. Like most udon dishes, this udon is of Japanese cuisine and it literally translates into “Fox Udon”. It was given this name because of the deep fried and seasoned tofu packet which resides on top of the noodles. The tofu is known as “aburaage” and it is apparently a favorite food of Japanese foxes.

Oops! I just noticed this picture left out the brand name which would be on the top left hand side. It's a Korean brand, nothing new though. These "Kitsune Udon" noodles are produced by the Korean company of Wang. Japanese noodles...being produced by a Korean company. Hmm, I wonder if Japanese companies produce Korean noodles?

The contents of the package were fairly simple. 1. Noodles, 2. Sauce, and 3. The Aburaage.

The noodles, the sauce, and the aburaage poured into the bowl. The sauce smelled exactly like the same sauce that was used for an earlier udon post we had on this blog. I suppose most udons use the same soup base. I was quite surprised to see an actual...packet of aburaage in the bag. I was expecting some small, crumbled pieces to come out but instead we got the whole thing! I was very excited to taste it. (Oops before I forget! Similar to other big-bowled noodles, this was a double boiler container in which we pour hot water into the bowl and then microwave it for 3 minutes!)

Ahhh~ The wonderful aroma of udon is simply...wonderful! Out of any noodle's broth I've drank, udon soup is absolutely my favorite! This is a picture just when we took it out of the microwave. Surprisingly, the aburaage was quite solid. Picking it up with the chopsticks did nothing but make it flop over the lower stick! I thought it was going to be flimsy and break at the slightest touch...but somehow they made it so that the subtance would be chewy...

YES! FIRST BITE GET! After about 5 minutes of trying to rip a piece of the aburaage off with chopsticks, I managed to get a bite with both the aburaage and the noodles. Honestly...it tasted like plain udon, which by no means is bad at all! I was however, expecting a different taste since it's apparently different enough from regular udon to bare a different name.

I took two pictures of Aisha slurping noodles and apparently this is the less "serious" one. Ahaha, a serious noodle slurper will always be serious. She also thought they tasted normal too.

I am far to lazy too brush my hair to eat noodles...unless brushing my hair makes the noodles taste better, which I doubt it. Despite being in the soup for so long, the aburaage maintained its form. It was very, very chewy and quite yummy actually. It gave off this sort of sour, yet sweet flavor. Aisha and I couldn't exactly pinpoint the exact flavor since it soaked up the broth like a sponge.

Aisha ripping off a piece of the aburaage with her teeth. It really was hard to bite a piece off. The soup had made it not only hot, but a lot thicker. When we bit into it, soup gushed out on both ends of the tofu. I believe this was Aisha's last bite as I remember finishing the rest off. After eating the rest of it, I figured out it tasted similar to the packets used for inari sushi. Not to mention, it also had the same texture just...chewier.

Hmm…what to say as the final words. Honestly, there isn’t much detail to add to this post for anyone who has already eaten udon before. However… if you, yes you, the reader, have not eaten udon before then…udon are basically thick noodles that are eaten with a slightly sweetened broth. (Which I’m sure has a proper name…) If you’re curious, go ahead and try them. I highly recommend it.

Our rating is: 3.25 with ratings of 3.5 and 3 respectively. Might have been better if it had a different flavoring than regular udon.

Currylicious!!!

noodleslurper — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 18:00:01 +0000

So hi all! It’s been awhile~ This post was going to be the Panda brand that PNut got us but it expired. Unlike most expired noodles it really smelled bad so we decided not to try our luck with it. Today’s noodles(or really 2 weeks ago. . .) are Curry flavored soup with rice noodles!

As you can see from the cover these noodles are made by the same company that made the "Pho" noodles we had awhile back. And because it was rice noodles we feared it would turn out like the previous one, which was very mushy.

As usual, the before pic of the noodles and as we feared, its noodles were exactly the same. The powder smelled wonderful though.

So many noodles on one pair of chopsticks. . .How I wished that I could had THAT as my first bite!

Why....so...serious! As you can see I take my noodle tasting hobby very seriously >:( The noodles were WONDERFUL! They came out as they should have been and the curry flavor made me think of indian curry.

Of course I am not nearly as serious as my dad . . . .Thats the face of a true noodle eater!

Mima is the only one with a normal face. . . .too little of a bite to put her serious face on.She thinks that overall it was decent though the noodles could have been better and the curry was "odd" tasting but I would disagree.

These noodles were REALLY good! The flavor of curry was not overpowering nor was it too weak. As I said earlier the flavor reminded me of Indian curry so if you like that you’d probably like this. If I had another packet I would have gone and made another one just like I did for the Mami noodles.

I unfortunately lost the paper that I had with our scores but I’m pretty sure it was rated 3.25/5. I think it’s only that high because we all love curry.

Swine Flu

fairnoodle — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 04:37:16 +0000

The Noodle Slurping Team will be taking a brief break while we recover from the swine flu. That hasn’t stopped us from eating our favorite noodles from Vina Pho in Burien which we have found to have therapeutic benefits.

Vina Pho to go good for your health

Eating soup ... Aisha asked not to be photographed. Hopefully, Aisha and Mima will be feeling better soon.

“Worms in Dirt”

Mima — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 05:06:47 +0000

You know…we’ve come across some pretty nasty noodles…but this….THIS….probably has been the worst one so far. I keep typing lines in here and deleting them as I try to describe it without putting pictures, and..as you can see from the lack of description I am failing at it. Sigh..okay I’ll just start with the pictures…

Here's yet another Korean noodle from a brand familiar to our blog; Assi. Yea...most of them are Korean since our first noodle-shopping experience was done at a Korean store. But ahem...anyways these are black bean paste noodles. They didn't really sound appetizing...but the cover made them look /kind/ of good....

This was another one of those double boiler type of noodles. Aka; put hot water in and then microwave for 3 minutes. Noodle package on the bottom with all the condiments on top. I can only wonder what the heck "flake soup" is...but okay. The small red package is the pepper powder. Sigh..what's up with Koreans and spicyness in their noodles? Also, I'm probably the ONLY person who finds the 'sauce' packet to be amusing. Anyone find amusement in a packet simply labeled as 'sauce' besides me? ...Didn't think so.

Okay first step...I found this odd. If anyone read our post about the 'jjajjang noodles', then you would know that it's simply drained noodles with sauce on it. These noodles were also like that, but instead of boiling the noodles by themselves, we had to put this "flake soup" packet on it. There was no powder in it...just...the stuff you see floating around in regular soup-based noodles. But yea, we had to boil it in this and then drain the water from the container....It didn't smell good at all when it finished. My dad said they smelled "stale"...if that's possible for noodles.

After draining the noodles, the first step was to pour the sauce. I smelled some of it before pouring, and weirdly, it smelled similar to indomie.... It...doesn't really look good does it? Honestly I felt like I was pouring a packet of jellied-oil on our noodles. Bleh...

Yes...the noodles gave us love, but we were unable to give it back. While I was pouring pepper powder I accidentally made a heart shape with it...so Aisha snapped a shot before I poured more. Pretty cool..I guess. Excuse me while I gag while looking at the sauce...

Err...I don't remember who, but ONE of us was stirring this nasty concoction. It was very..slimy as you'll see....

My sister compared the noodles to slimy worms in dirt..hence the title of this blog post. They were hard to grip a lot with the chopsticks and they kept sliding off as we tried to eat them. Really, it didn't smell or look appetizing after we finished "preparing" it. Yea the sauce smelled kind of like the heavenly 'indomie', but once it was all together...eww.... Also...when you swished the container they made a very nasty....slimy sound...which I found funny and I ended up swishing it many times.

This was actually my second bite, slightly re-enacted for a semi-decent photo. These were the first noodles to actually make me spit out my first bite. I tasted it and just spat it out in the trash without even trying to eat it. They were just...not meant for eating if you ask me. Slimy, slightly mushy noodles mixed in thick, gunky sauce that really had a nasty, yet very bland flavor...It was just so empty that it was gross. The texture just made the overall experience worse as you can tell from my expression. (Notice how it's just a SINGLE NOODLE as well...)

My sister taking maybe her 2nd or 3rd bite. She kept eating it as she tried to assess the flavor. She thought it was very interesting, and like myself, was unable to describe it in words. She said she might have eaten more than she did if I didn't put all the spice-powder into it...She must have a really tolerant tongue compared to mine cause...just ick I could not eat anymore of that.

This was only PART of what was left in the container. For the first time in Noodle-Quest history...we, the noodle slurpers, could NOT finish a pack of noodles! (Well...it would be the tomyum, but the first time we ate that was before our questing days so those don't really count..) You can't really blame us either...would YOU eat an entire package of noodles like these?!

My dad was sick so there are no pictures of him for this blog. We gave him a small portion of the noodles to taste for the sake of the blog. He said, like the rest of us, that the noodles were very slimy. He also said that…there was a bit of taste, but it was very bland and pretty much it was just a bland flavor with spice in it. Doesn’t sound appetizing does it?

Our overall score was: 1.42 with scores 1, 1.5, and 1.75 respectively.

While my dad and I probably wouldn’t try it again, Aisha did some research and read on other blogs how delicious these noodles are. So…possibly if we tried REAL black bean paste noodles they’d be good, but this is all the instant one gets from us.

ps; To a certain pnut, we’ll do your panda noodles soon. Trying to get rid of the fresh noodles that will expire first before we can slurp yours.

Udon mm mm good

fairnoodle — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 07:00:59 +0000

Sempio Fresh Cup Udon

With a 4.0 average rating, the Korean made Sempio Fresh Cup Noodle has taken the lead as our top rated noodle dish. The Fresh Cup Noodle is truly a fresh, soft, fat, delicious udon noodle. In fact its so fresh, noodle lovers need to be aware that it has a limited shelf life. Ours had expired 10 days earlier (October 2nd). After a careful inspection and sniff, Amira declared it fit for consumption.

Inside the package, we had already opened the noodles to make sure they were still good

The package came with the soft noodles, a soy sauce and fish flavor packet and a dry packet with onions and flavor balls. Preparation of the noodles was different than other noodles that we have eaten so far. Add the flavor packet, add boiling water, then microwave for an additional 3 minutes. Then add the dry packet and enjoy.

The finished soup after adding boiling water, microwaving and adding the dry flavor packet. It smelled great!

Large chewy noodles

The noodles were delicious. Chewy not mushy and I was able to slurp the noodles easily even with my limited slurping ability. The broth was great, delicious and flavorful but not overpowering. Amira drank from the bowl, unfortunately I was unable to snap a picture of that.

Aisha and Mima work on finishing the noodles

When I reviewed the ingredients I was very surprised by the large number of ingredients in the soup (maybe that’s what made it taste good). This included several familiar but not so healthy sounding ingredients, including MSG (makes soup more flavorful), emulsifier, sodium alginate, disodium inosinate (makes MSG work better), disodium guanylate, sucralose, sodium benzoate, sodium succinate, oligosaccharide, malto-dextrin, and laver (I have no idea what laver is). Altogether there were 90 ingredients in the simple udon soup. Enough to cause me some concern but not enough to stop me from eating them.

The list of 90 ingredients required to make a simple udon soup

The noodles were rated 4.0 out of 5.0 by all three of us. I recommend the noodles but with the ingredients you may not want to eat them every day. Or if you do eat them every day, don’t read the ingredients list. I will be interested in comparing the ingredient list with a Japanese Udon.

Phake Fo

noodleslurper — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 00:37:39 +0000

Almost a week late… thinking about changing my name to expirednoodles instead of noodleslurper. Continuing what my fellow noodle eaters have started, I bring you the final noodles we had that Sunday night. It was our first instant Pho and I think our first Viet noodles. (And yes the title typo is on purpose.) Ironically, this is Korean made despite being Viet Noodles.

Behold! The packet that we all looked forward to eating! The front makes it look very good, yes?

Unfortunately we did not get a picture of the noodles with the powder and stuff on it.....but yum packets

The noodles' in all its glory! Honestly looking at the picture makes my mouth water....

Oh....how the first bite was so very disappointing. It looked great. It smelled great. It tasted great but....the noodles were very mushy! We did not let it soak up for that long yet you could probably swish the noodles between your teeth like jello.

Cousin Rilla taking her first bite...I actually don't remember what she thought of it. Meh, the losses you get in a post when it's 1 week after its been eaten. Thanks to the comment below I now know that she liked the flavor but agreed about disliking the mushyness of the noodles.

Cousin Sulay and his mom eating the soup together. From what I can see they look like they are enjoying it wouldn't you think?

And so ends the spam of pictures. Everyone agreed that the broth tasted really well although it did not taste at all like Pho soup. It was slightly spicy but unlike the Tomyum noodles the spicy-ness added to the flavor rather than overpowering it. Overall, I enjoyed these noodles though they would have been way better with a different type of noodle.

Ratings: 2, 1.5 and 2. Overall Rating: 1.75

So if you are in the mood for some good soup dump the noodles and use the packets on something else.

Onion Breath Anyone?

fairnoodle — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 04:27:46 +0000

If you like real artificial onion flavor then the Dragonfly Brand Mi Hanh Noodles are for you. These were our first noodles from China, the girls had been intentionally avoiding Chinese noodles so I must have selected the noodles ( I am a sucker for packaging). I thought the noodles themselves were some of the best noodles we have eaten so far they were chewy instead of mushy and very tasty.

Dragonfly Mi Hanh Soup anyone? I must have been attracted to the hot pink packaging and large onions in the picture mmm

The soup had a packet of dehydrated onions, shallots, carrots and cabbage that came with the seeming standard powder and oil/fat package.

A nice picture of the dry noodles with flavor packs. Imagine my great surprise and joy when I found that the package contained a free bonus plastic fork! They didn't even advertise it on the outside of the package. I would have bought the soup just for the fork.

Unfortunately, soup itself was bland and lacked the flavor (both good and bad) of some of the other soups we have sampled. I guess the artificial onion flavor can only be so strong. Desirability of the soup really came down to whether you like onions. One of our guest samplers, Aishah, who loves onions really loved the soup while understandably her daughter, Farah, who hates onions didn’t care for the soup.

This picture really shows the quality of the noodles firm, chewy and tasty

Me trying to properly slurp the noodles. I just don't seem to have the sucking power needed to be a champion slurper. Maybe its because I had too many noodles on my chopsticks?

I have been gathering data on nutritional data on the soups that I will discuss in a future post. But I have to mention that the Mi Hanh soup is the current champion for “most sodium in a soup”. It had a whopping 120% of the daily recommended value. I am glad we were sharing the soup!

Mima talks to the noodles as only a true noodle whisperer can. Be brave little noodles, be firm, be tasty.

The soup was rated a 2 by Aisha, 2.5 by Mima and a 3 by me. I gave it a 3 because the noodles were so good. I am going to try to find different Dragonfly brand noodle flavor to see if it results in a better overall soup.

Nasty Noodle Surprise!

Mima — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 01:26:40 +0000

First off, apologies for the lack of posts and also for the horrible quality of the pictures that will follow. Our mother left to Hawaii for a bit, and took her nice camera with her…so we ended up using my cousin’s camera for this, and the next two posts to follow.

Today shall be the first of who-knows-how-many “guest eater” blogs in which we share our noodles with friends and family and feature them in our writings. (We actually ate these noodles yesterday, but I’m writing the post here today.) We bombarded our grandma’s house with 3 different brands of noodles for all who was there to taste. Though today’s blog I shall only be writing about one. The dreaded “nasty” noodles that I’ve been mentioning since the first post here shall finally be revealed…

And HERE they are! I wasn't 100% sure at first if this was the correct brand..but when I opened the package and saw what was in it, the horrible memories of my first time consuming these noodles all came rushing back to me! They're Thai "tom yum" noodles which were shrimp-flavored.I've never had REAL tom-yum, so it was hard to expect something delicious from these.

The container held two packets; one of powder, the other of...chunky...gushy...stuff....honestly, I wasn't sure what it was. The powder smelled okay, but I found out that all the flavor (and the smell! YUCK!) comes from the second packet with the gushy mixture in it. My sister, our cousin Rilla, and I were all "Eww"ing at the smell the packet produced. It was a fishy-ginger sort of smell...a very strong one at that.

You know..they don't really LOOK that bad do they? Any normal noodle eater would suspect them to be normal noodles with some spicy broth judging from how red it is...but honestly eyes are so easily decieved. When we popped the "cap" from the steaming hot bowl, the smell devoured the kitchen. To us, it smelled like very, VERY strong ginger...it wasn't very appealing that's for sure.

None of us really wanted to eat it first...but our cousin Zaki was interested in how they would taste, so he bravely took the first bite....As soon as his slurping finished, he popped up and said, "These aren't that bad!" The people in the room (My dad, my sister, his sister Rilla, and me) were SHOCKED at his reaction! The DREADFULLY nasty noodles...AREN'T bad?! What is this madness?! My dad argued it was like eating a piece of ginger and then taking a bite of noodles, but my cousin honestly though they were really good...we weren't sure of his tastebuds at the time though, since he had a cold.

Rilla slurping down her first bite....Her first comments were that it was EXTREMELY SPICY as well as very stinky....she however, believed that it tasted better than it smelled....but it was definitely not one of the best noodles she's tasted.

The middle brother/cousin Sulay taking his bite. He also thought it was very spicy, but didn't seem to mind the strong "ginger" flavor all too much. He proceeded to drink some of the broth, and immediately came out from it coughing. My dad and his older brother did the same. It was so spicy it forced you to cough...I felt that the spiciness really over-powered the flavor...if the flavor had been good I would have cared, but since it wasn't..well...you know.

"I like it!"...were the first words to come out of my friend Hannah's mouth as soon as those noodles were down. My mouth dropped at her reaction...my father, my sister and I all made eye contact and laughed as ANOTHER person liked these noodles! Surely they weren't mad...were they? Hannah just kept telling me they were really, really good. I could not believe my ears and eyes as people ate these noodles and actually COMPLIMENTED them.

Hannah's mother, Sister Aishah as we call her, had to take off her glasses while taking a SECOND bite of these noodles. Her lenses got steamed up from the heat which was a hilarious sight. She enthusiastically agreed with her daughter that these noodles were very good! She also informed us that what we were smelling and tasting wasn't ginger, but it was actually some part of the lemon-grass plant. (Still tasted like ginger to me....) She liked it so much she even asked us where we bought it from! (We bought it from H-mart by the way for anyone who is interested.)

Just to show you how much these noodles ended up being LOVED, here is the completely empty bowl that was left behind. All the noodles were devoured...all the broth had been slurped. Nothing was left in this bowl except the lingering strong odor of the soup.

My aunt and uncle arrived later and I let my aunt smell the bowl of the tom-yum to see if she would enjoy it. These noodles tasted very similar to what they smelled. She thought the aroma smelled nice. I wonder if it is our sanity or theirs that should be questioned with these results…or maybe we just happen to like very different things.

Even as I start to wrap up this post…I still wonder how these noodles which we thought were so utterly disgusting, ended up being delicious, loved, and completely gone. I mean seriously…I was expecting to post pictures of people spitting this stuff out…but instead everyone slurped it up willingly and they enjoyed it. I’m not sure if I was disappointed or happy with these reactions…but it sure made for an interesting story to tell.

Our overall rating (Just from us 3 noodlers): 1.17 (1, 1 and 1.5 respectively)

We felt that not only was the lemon-grass over powering, but the spiciness was too much to even enjoy the flavor. (If the flavor had been any good to begin with.) However…I guess that’s just us.