Chinese Instant Noodles

When I visited H-Mart, Korean grocer, last time, I found instant noodles made in China & in Korea. Although I have read that some kids died because of poisoning eating instant noodles, I ventured to try. Considering how many people lives in China, the risk should be low. :D

This is the one I tried: Original Hot & Sour Flavour Instant Vermicelli. I am big fan of Hot & Sour flavour and also of the sweet potato flour noodles, and that was why I could not resist. I think it costed me 60p or so. Later I found the same thing in also Spa in the university (UoB).



These are the things contained in the packet.



The noodles are not usual rice flour vermicelli, but made of sweet potato starch flour. Sweet potato flour noodles are not sweet and do not taste of sweet potato. They are greyish and opaque in colour and tougher in consistency.

Then, the red bag is chili sauce & refined palm oil (!). White balls below are soy beans. The black bag is vinegar. Then the silver bag contains "gourmet powder". Yes, "gourmet powder", so is written in ingredients table. And I am afraid it is mainly MSG (Monosodium Glutamate).

The instruction said that I just had to keep the noodles in hot water, but I boiled them, as I like hot soup. Nutritionally, the instant noodles aren't good, so I put some stir-fried vegetable on top. Here is the outcome.



The floating white balls are soy beans. I have never seen this use before, and I don't think they added any flavour to the dish.

They tasted lovely... in a junk-food way. I was surprised that the MSG soup did not taste awful (and I am disappointed in my taste buds...). I started to wonder how much MSG I eat when I eat at Chinese restaurants.

It was an interesting experiment, but I still don't like the idea of eating that much MSG in one go. :(