FOOD FRIDAY: Cheap noodles, explained
Indignity Vol. 5, No. 7
FOOD FRIDAY DEP'T.
FOOD FRIDAY: Watching the Instant Ramen Video Primer
THIS EPICURIOUS VIDEO showed up on my Bluesky timeline in December, and I watched seven or eight minutes' worth of it, which was about four times as long as I'm usually able to make myself watch a YouTube video in my feed. I only stopped because something outside my computer demanded my attention, and later on, I went to the trouble of searching for the video so I could see the whole thing. It's nearly 20 minutes and I could have kept watching for twice that.
The title pretty much covers it: "Pro Chefs Blind Taste Test Every Instant Ramen." The chefs are Eunjo Park, formerly of Momofuku Kāwi and Ssäm Bar; Douglas Kim of Jeju Noodle Bar; and Toshiaki Kondo of Rockmeisha. They're not really tasting every instant ramen, and even the more modest claim within the video of "Every Instant Ramen Brand We Could Get Our Hands On" requires the viewer to believe that the clearly New York–based production somehow couldn't get to an H Mart. But it's a lot of kinds of instant ramen! And the chefs are very, very good at tasting them.
More importantly, they are good at explaining what they're tasting. Beyond delivering clear, confident explanations of which noodles are good or bad, and why, the chefs offer the cultural, chemical, and structural accounts of why the various noodles are the way they are. And they're hilariously skilled—especially Park—at identifying exactly which brand is in front of them.
The pacing and editing are so deft it wasn't until my return watch that I understood that the three panelists weren't actually sitting around tasting the noodles together. Their judgments converge so cleanly, or the video plays their different preferences off each other in such a natural way, it comes across as a group effort. It left me with the sense that there was a vast body of convenience-noodle expertise out there that I had only just begun to apprehend—while also reassuring me that the Sapporo Ichiban Original Flavor in the pantry meant I was already, despite myself, on the right track.
Previously in FOOD FRIDAY
SIDE PIECES DEPT.
Tom Scocca
FOR FLAMING HYDRA, I wrote about the newest and most inhuman layer of interference between users and Google search results:
Even here, four clicks in, rather than directing me to information people had published about Baryshnikov, Google was still directing me to what its own machinery had decided must be the answer that someone Googling “baryshnikov” would want—and on the lowest possible trajectory of knowledge-seeking: showing me a passage serving some hypothetical user who knew enough to type the name without knowing it belonged to a famous dancer...
When I type “baryshnikov”into a Google search, what I mean is what I’ve meant ever since Google first appeared and began conquering the search industry: out of everything people have filed away on the internet, please show me what would be in the drawer marked “Baryshnikov.” What Google now assumes I’m asking is “Baryshnikov????”
WEATHER REVIEWS
New York City, January 9, 2025
★★ The bright, harsh real winter continued. Cold air crept around the usually overheated apartment. Buds swelled against the empty blue sky, and the wind pounced teeth-first. The cold came up through sneaker soles and thick socks at every step up the stairs into the Park, making the moving parts inside the foot sting. The upper chest burned from breathing, the way it burned decades ago on the middle school cross-country course in gym class, in the old climate. On the crest of the Great Hill, the wind rose in an awful crescendo, sending tiny leaves and a cloud of dust running before it. The grassy ground was still not quite as frost-hardened as the January ground of old, but it was getting there. Fingertips were in pain inside the gloves. The notebook stayed cold to the touch long after being brought back indoors.
EASY LISTENING DEP'T.
HERE IS TODAY'S Indignity Morning Podcast.
Tom Scocca
Click on this box to find the Indignity Morning Podcast archive.
TOM SCOCCA
ADVICE DEP'T.
GOT SOMETHING YOU need to justify to yourself, or to the world at large? Other columnists are here to judge you, but The Sophist is here to tell you why you’re right. Direct your questions to The Sophist, at indignity@indignity.net, and get the answers you want.
SANDWICH RECIPES DEP'T.
WE PRESENT INSTRUCTIONS in aid of the assembly of sandwiches selected from Institution Recipes For Use In Schools, Colleges, Hospitals And Other Institutions, by Emma Smedley, Director of Public School Luncheons, Philadelphia, Pa.; Formerly Instructor in Domestic Science, Drexel Institute, Philadelphia, Pa.; Instructor in Dietetics, The Johns Hopkins Hospital Training School for Nurses, Baltimore, Md, published in 1919 and available at archive.org for the delectation of all.
Lettuce Sandwiches
(50 Sandwiches)
6 heads lettuce
1 quart Boiled Dressing II
12 ounces butter
100 slices bread
Have the lettuce crisp and thoroughly dried. Place between slices of buttered bread and spread lettuce with the boiled dressing.
Calories in recipe 1,261 protein, 11,148 total
Calories in one sandwich: 25 protein, 223 total
Shredded Lettuce Sandwiches
(50 Sandwiches)
4 heads lettuce
6 cups Boiled Dressing III
100 slices bread
Shred lettuce and mix with the dressing. Spread on slices of unbuttered bread. This is a satisfactory way of using the outer leaves of lettuce.
Calories in recipe 1,246 protein, 8,957 total
Calories in one sandwich: 25 protein, 179 total
Boiled Dressing III
(3 1/2 Quarts)
6 tablespoons mustard
6 tablespoons flour
2 1/2 tablespoons salt
1 tablespoon sugar
1 1/2 cups vinegar
1 quart milk
9 eggs
1/4 pound butterine
1 quart thin cream, whipped
Mix together all the dry ingredients, add beaten eggs, vinegar, milk and butterine and cook over hot water until quite thick. When thoroughly chilled add the whipped cream. This dressing is specially nice for lettuce sandwiches.
Sour cream may be used instead of sweet cream. When this is done decrease the amount of vinegar used.
Calories in recipe 440 protein, 4,017 total
Calories in one sandwich: 126 protein, 1,147 total
If you decide to prepare and attempt to enjoy a sandwich inspired by this offering, be sure to send a picture to indignity@indignity.net.
