Myojo Chukazanmai Japanese Style Noodles Oriental Flavor

Country of origin: Japan
Bought at Korean Market in Homewood, AL for $1.49

So these are the first noodles from Japan I've reviewed! The land of the rising sun, the birthplace of ramen, at least in instant form. Mr. Nissin (the Top Ranen guy!) invented it a little after World War II as a cheap, easy and portable way to eat delicious noodles anywhere, anytime. Pretty much. These are some I picked up at the Korean Market, which is supposedly also home to a Korean BBQ restaurant, even though every time I've been by there the store is open but the restaurant is closed. So I guess we'll see later on.
Anyway, these noodles come in some neat packaging and look pretty dang tasty in the picture. They also come in a variety of flavors. I picked up a spicy variant as well so if these are good then I'll be excited about those! Here we go.

It's a single layer block of noodles like those MAMA ones were but there are still a good size amount of noodles here. It's a 100g noodle block as you can see on the package, the average size ones being about 85g and the Samyang ones being about 120g. You also get a big pack of soup base which smells like Chinese food and a pack of soy sauce with sesame oil. Sounds good.

These came out pretty well. I cooked them for 5 minutes to get the consistency about where I like it. The package said 4 but they just didn't seem done. They taste pretty dang good, similar to the sesame chicken ramen because of all the sesame oil, even though there's no chicken in here. When this soup cooks some it really is a lot more noodles than it looks like at first. These were pretty good and I would definitely eat them again. I can't wait to try some other flavors! 9/10

Ummm.... Aritifical Beef Flavor Ramen?

Country of Origin: China
Bought at Super Oriental Market for 59¢

I think I'm gonna call this one Mystery Beef, because the only English on this package is ARTIFICIAL BEEF FLAVORED INSTANT RAMEN NOODLES. Well, at least you know what you're eating. Everything else is in Chinese from my best guess. How do you say "Open Sesame" in Chinese?

We figured it out. Inside the pack you get a really cool round noodle block like Shin Ramyun, a decent size pack of veggies and a soup base with 03 emblazoned on it with a red stripe like a race car.The veggies are onions and carrots and the soup base smells beefy as can be so let's check this one out.

Here's the finished product. I microwaved this one for 4 minutes based on the quantity of noodles here and it came out great. These have a stanky smell that you notice when you take it out of the microwave... just push on through because these are some tasty noodles. These have a kind of sweet taste to them, maybe some ginger or something? They are pretty good overall, and have a beefy flavor and pleasant taste. I'm giving this one an 8/10. Kudos to whoever makes them, if I could read Chinese or Japanese I'd tell you. I'm proud of myself for trying them anyway even though I have only a slight idea of what these would be like. Came out good though. I'd definitely try these again.

SEMI NON RELATED NOTE: I don't type nearly as well as usual when I've been drinking and have taken Ambien. Time to head to bed. Good night!

Paldo Chicken Flavor Ramen

Country of origin: Korea
Bought at Super H Mart in Atlanta, GA

Some more I picked up at H Mart on our trip down there. I'd heard of Paldo noodles before but never seen any before so I decided to try 'em. The extremely happy cartoon chef on the package is reassuring that these will be delicious. What'm I waitin' for?

It's a bigass block o' noodles with two packs of stuff. Soup base has a garlic and pepper smell to it and there's a pack of flakes with green onions, carrots, and these other things that I have no idea what the hell they could be. The ingredient list on the package was no help as the few words of broken English are garlic, carrot and noodle.

I had to cook this one for about six minutes to get the noodles to the texture I wanted them. I think it may have been a little bit stale. See those square things? Those are the things I'm talkin' about. No earthly idea what they are. I ate some of em and they taste like the rest of the soup and have a chewy texture. This soup is very very average stuff. It has a lot of noodles which is good if you're hungry and it's really not bad... just nothing special. I'd say it's about as good as chicken Top Ramen with some veggies added. I rate Top Ramen a 5/10, so I'll give this one a 6/10.

Top Ramen Curry Flavor (Smooth Noodles!)

Country of origin: India
Bought at Indonesian Market in Atlanta, GA

I've had some pretty damn bad luck with Indian noodles. I love Indian food as I've said time and time again but this ain't no chicken tikka masala. I'm willing to keep an open mind for this one though. I mean look at all the words of encouragement on the package! Spicy AND tasty? Whoa! No added MSG... I actually consider this a downside... I mean MSG is tasty stuff. The cake taker in this case though is the claim that these noodles are smoooooooooth... I mean smooth like peanut butter... smooth like Barry White. I'm getting carried away, so let's check these out.

When I opened the package a whiff of curry powder hit me in the face. I expected that, though, but man it was kinda intense. Must be the TASTE MIX. The taste mix is pretty much just curry powder as far as I can tell.

Looks nasty. Smells like Indian food. Tastes like butt. This stuff is seriously nasty tasting. I'd expect something that's called Top Ramen to at least be average... this one is getting a 2/10 from me. Definitely not smooth either!

Nongshim Kimchi Ramen BIG Bowl!

Country of origin: Korea
Bought at Tokyo Asian food for $1.99

Damn! That's a BIG bowl! It actually is a big ramen bowl, weighing in it 114g. It's probably got twice the noodles as the smaller bowl I reviewed several reviews ago. I came home from work at about 2 AM and wanted something quick and easy to eat and I saw this bigass bowl just sitting on top of my ramen stash. It called to me... saying "I'm a bigass bowl of ramen. You should eat me." So I did.

Here's another pic of the bowl so y'all can kind of gauge just how big the BIG bowl is. It also comes with...

a bigass seasoning pack! It really is big. Easily the size of two and a half, maybe three standard soup base packs. Remember, hands off the microwave for this one unless you want to start a fire.

So here's the end result. The soup is nearly identical to the soup in the smaller bowl. No surprise there. As I said before this bowl has about twice the noodles as the other bowl as well as a bunch more vegetables. It's chock full of mushrooms, green onions, carrots and cabbage. The noodles soak up a lot of soup while they are steaming so they are very flavorful and tasty. Nongshim noodles are usually good quality and these are no exception. If you're hungry for a bigass bowl of kimchi ramen, definitely pick this one up. Three minutes to happiness. 8/10

Tiger Tiger Easy Snax Rice Noodles with Satay Sauce

Country of origin: Thailand
Bought at Big Lots for $1.50

So these are some more of the closeout noodles I got at Big Lots the other day. I was really happy with the Nongshim noodle bowls I picked up for 75 cents each and here's some new stuff I've never seen before. It comes in a cool Chinese take out style box and says that there's no water or anything required, just mix it up, heat it up and eat it up.Could be good... right?

Well I followed the directions and here's what I got. Looks like a box of brains to me... I'd call this stuff zombie chow. The awesome thing about these though is it comes with a spork! Not a fork. Not a spoon. A spork! Like they give prison inmates. Here's a pic of my wife enjoying the spork:

It is pretty cool. But that's where the coolness ends. This stuff tastes like butt. There's just no nice way to say it. I took one bite and was disgusted. It really seems to me what eating brains would be like. Chewy consistency and not in a good way, goopy sauce and nasty ass taste. Avoid these like the plague. Which begs the question, how did one avoid the plague back in those plague days? I'm pretty sure eating this nastiness wouldn't help. I'm giving it a 1/10 for the spork and the cool packaging. Everything else here sucks.

Ve Wong Kung-Fu Vietnam Beef Flavor Ramen

Country of origin: Vietnam
Bought at Super Oriental Market
Price: 59¢

So here's another KUNG FU noodle from Ve Wong. Ve Wong noodles tend to be either really good or not good at all. This one is "Vietnam flavor" according to the package. Tastes like war, or communism maybe? Anyway, most Ve Wong noodles are from Taiwan, but these are from Vietnam. Maybe they're made by someone else? Well, their website is in Chinese so I guess we'll never know. On to the noodles!

Regular ol' noodle block with a bigass veggie pack with carrots, corn, onions and fake beef thingies, soup base, and some soy sauce. Usually fake beef thingies don't taste good, but I'm willing to give this one a shot. Here goes.

Well, it's ok. It's got a lot of noodles for sure, and a little bit of spicy flavor, but not much. The fake meat thingies are better than some others I've had... they actually do have taste to them and have a decent texture. The noodles in this one seem to be a little bit better quality than other Ve Wongers, also. The soup itself tastes like pretty standard beef ramen with a little bit of spice. There is a lot of oil sitting on top of the soup and if you mix it up it still settles back on top. So if you don't like oily or greasy ramen, don't get this one. I thought it was ok though, I'm giving it a 7/10.