Don't Settle For Sad, Watery Instant Ramen. One Ingredient Transforms Your Broth (And You Already Own It)

One of the elements that constitutes a good ramen — the kind you can get from authentic Japanese restaurants — is a nice, delicious broth. Deriving from this idea, even instant ramen can be held to the same standard because the base is an important component that makes or breaks the soup; hence, sad, watery instant ramen is out and a thick and creamy broth is in. 

To transform the basic prepackaged noodle into one with a luscious body, try adding gelatin — a kitchen staple you most likely already own. It allows you to shortcut your way into a creamy consistency without spending the whole day trying to draw out the natural collagen from meat, which is common when you make broth from scratch.

Gelatin is a powerhouse ingredient in the culinary world, often used as a thickener, so while this simple hack might raise a few eyebrows, this idea didn't come from nowhere. Of course, use unflavored gelatin for a neutral taste. But before you use it, you need to properly bloom the gelatin, and by bloom, we mean tenderizing the ingredient, so it easily dissolves once you introduce it to your instant ramen.

To upgrade instant ramen to a richer, thicker bowl of noodles, bloom gelatin by adding room-temperature water to it. A great rule is to stick to a 3:1 water-to-gelatin ratio. You'll know when it's ready once the texture starts looking like tomato paste. Determining how much gelatin is needed can be a bit tricky, so you might need to go through some trial and error. Start with two packets of gelatin and go from there. 

Once the gelatin has bloomed, you can add the instant ramen seasoning packet and then boil them together before tossing in the noodles. As good food is also about texture, this will completely change how you typically enjoy your noodles. And it helps that the flavor from the seasoning packet will be left unchanged. To make it extra creamy, you can upgrade your instant ramen with peanut butter, but only if you want a nutty addition.

While this can theoretically work with all instant ramen soup, it can change the game for seafood noodles and even the famous buldak carbonara, which plenty of people on the internet love to add extra creaminess to. To mimic store-bought noodles or to simply elevate them further, add toppings by tossing in some chopped green onions, boiled eggs, cheese, or sausage.