8 Healthy Ways to Include More Ramen Noodles into Your Diet

Ramen noodles are often referred to as more of a cheap and convenient meal choice, instead of something you actually look forward to. However, as we’ve discovered after so many years of being attached to them, they have so much more potential as a daily diet option.

To help you expand your opinion on ramen noodles as an awesome dietary staple, here are 8 healthy ways to include more ramen noodles into your diet. 

Eat Plant-Based Ramen Recipes

Vegan-friendly plant-based ramen recipes are generally better suited to daily consumption. 

Now, that’s not to say you can’t enjoy ramen with meat and eggs. It’s just that with plant-based ramen recipes, you get all the benefits of standard ramen but with more fiber and food that’s generally easier to digest.

According to the National Center for Biotechnology Information, a plant-based diet promotes a more diverse microbiome, or stomach ecosystem. This means not just a more balanced diet, but a super-healthy one for the stomach. 

Here are some plant-based ramen recipes that you can try making. 

For the best meat substitutes, you can use

• Chanterelle, porcini, and portobello mushrooms
• Tempeh or tofu. Tempeh has a depper, nuttier flavor
• Mung beans, kidney beans, and black eyed peas 
• Dry spiced or roasted jackfruit 

If you’re already on a vegan or plant-based diet, you can have healthy and delicious immi ramen whenever you want, guilt-free!

Try ‘Breakfast Ramen’

We found that the standard breakfast staple foods work great with ramen noodles. Ingredients such as eggs, sausage, bacon, savory oatmeal, beans, and hash browns are all great in a bowl of ramen.

This is something we discovered while looking for ingredient clusters for the perfect everyday bowls of ramen. We discovered that the texture and flavor that noodles naturally have is the ideal fit for the meals we’ve all come to expect from breakfast. 

Breakfast ramen is not a new thing either. Here are some quick and easy recipe ideas:

• Noodles topped with crispy bacon and sausage slivers
• Baked bean noodles on a bed of eggs
• Noodles scrambled in eggs
• Breakfast ramen burrito (use eggy noodles instead of scrambled eggs)

For a more ramen-centric dish, you can chop up bacon and tomatoes, and saute them in a little butter till the bacon is cooked through. Then stir fry it with the noodles for an awesome dry noodle breakfast. 

Have Noodles with Meat

Everyone loves a good meat dish. Well, what if we told you, you could replace the veggies or rice in meat dishes with noodles!

Yes, you heard that right, noodles as a side to steak is totally possible if you make it right. The best part about it is, ramen noodles are a lot better at carrying flavor than the traditional sides that we get with meat. 

For example, just with steak, you can have:

• Dry noodles stir fried with mixed herbs
• Maca-ramen and cheese
• Fresh noodle salad
• Fried noodles with kimchi

We would recommend having meaty flavored ramen such as our Spicy ‘Beef’ flavored immi ramen. You can customize the noodles however you want without having to worry about the flavor base, which we’ve perfected to taste as close to beef as possible. 

If you’re looking for even more diversity with your meat and ramen dishes, here are some amazingly bold and flavorful beef ramen recipes that we cooked up. 

Replace Rice with Noodles

Ramen noodles are a great replacement for rice in tons of dishes based on it. 

We already talked about how noodles can replace rice when served with steak. However, cuts of meat aren’t the only food that you can replace rice with noodles in. 

Traditional ramen noodles are made from wheat, which is a grain, similar to rice. This means that when cooked a certain way, they end up having similar textures. However, noodles absorb and carry flavor much better than rice. 

This is because of all the nooks and crannies that broth, gravy, sauces, and spices hide in, with ramen noodles! 

Some great ramen-rice replacement dishes are:

• Traditional egg fried rice
• Nasi goreng 
• Hainanese chicken and rice
• Sushi (yes, sounds weird but trust us, it’s a ticket to major flavortown!)

In case you’re watching your carb intake, you can have delicious immi ramen as a low-carb ramen version. 

Use Leaner Meats

Instead of topping ramen with pork belly, bacon, or other fatty cuts of meat, use leaner meats such as chicken breast, flank steak, or leaner fish such as haddock and pollock.

This will do two great things for you. Number one, it’ll let you eat as much proper ramen as you want without having to worry about the fat intake. Number two, it’ll leave you feeling fresh instead of heavy and sluggish after a meal.

In case you’re worried about your ramen meat being dry, don’t be. There is plenty of flavorful broth in ramen that will moisten the meat, plus you can always cook it (beef only) to a medium-rare. 

Here are some typical ramen meats and their leaner alternatives: 

• Pork belly – replace with leaner pork shoulder
• Chicken thighs – replace with chicken breast or duck breast
• Bacon (pork) – replace with either beef bacon or turkey bacon
• Beef short rib – replace with sirloin
• Mackerel and tuna – replace with haddock, pollock, and shrimp

Of course, we too were doubtful about sacrificing the delicious flavor that chashu pork belly develops. However, as we found, you really don’t have to let go of the flavor with the fat if you choose the right lean meats. 

Diversify Recipes

Use tons of different fruits and vegetables in the ramen recipes for both variety and to make it generally healthier.

This is the easiest way to create alternative but equally delicious versions of a dish, seeing as there are so many vegetables, legumes, grains, herbs, sauces, and spices to choose from. 

Diversifying recipes has a few advantages for everyone. These are:

• You don’t get bored with what you eat. This is especially true for people who want to eat more of one thing (like ramen) but have gotten bored of the same 4 flavors.
• You may add too many extra (and unhealthy) flavorings and sauces to try to liven up the noodles. Diversifying the base recipe prevents this.
• You actually look forward to the next happy experiment in the kitchen. Plus, cooking a tasty plate of food feels like an accomplishment, so you’ll feel great even before you start eating.

The best way to diversify what you’re eating is to use substitutes and alternatives to the regular ingredients. For example, use zucchini instead of eggplant, or bok choy instead of celery. Little things like these will soon begin to add up in terms of flavor and overall satisfaction. 

Use Less Salt

Salt (actually sodium) is the reason why most ramen recipes, especially those with instant ramen, are considered unhealthy. 

Too much sodium is bad for the heart and makes you look and feel bloated. This is because sodium retains water in the body, which also has the adverse effect of making you feel overly full when you’re done eating. 

To counter this, use low-sodium alternatives such as black salt (which also makes food taste like eggs), or spice mixes such as shichimi togarashi. 

In fact, here are some brilliant Asian spices that you can store in your kitchen for low-sodium cooking. 

Eat with Confidence!

Contrary to popular belief, ramen can actually be pretty healthy when you make it right, and with the right type of ramen. 

Unfortunately, instant ramen has collected somewhat of a bad rep as a result of some of the ingredients that manufacturers use. That’s exactly what we set out to counter (and we’re glad to say that we did!).

Ramen itself is a very versatile dish, so much so that you can make it with super-healthy ingredients, and it will still come out tasting pretty good. 

You can even go the immi ramen route and enjoy noodles that are not just delicious, but completely suitable for daily consumption.