Because of quarantine people are going out less and eating at home more. This can be problematic as having everyone in your house eat three meals a day, seven days a week, can cause households to quickly run out of groceries, even if they were to stock up last time they went grocery shopping.

“Usually me and my two brothers will go through 4 gallons of milk a week, and that’s with school in session. Right now with all of us home at the same time, and since I can’t drive to go out to eat on my own any more, we’re eating our food at a faster rate than usual,” Erik Wyatt (’20) said.

A way you can combat this is to have cheaper, non-perishable foods to eat intermittently with your other foods, so that instead of using all of the tasty, cornerstone lunch meats or produce in the house all at once, they can be ate less often and last longer.

Ramen noodles are one of the best examples of a cheap, non-perishable food that can be kept in bulk.

“Ramen is a necessity for me and most other people who were living in my sorority house. For less than 30 cents a pack, and the fact that it doesn’t go bad, it was really useful for when we didn’t want to spend a meal on our meal plan and didn’t have the proper amenities to cook with,” said Jessica Rothenberger, a student attending Southeast Missouri State University.

While cheap and easy, and even having a selection of flavors to choose from, ramen noodles can get pretty boring, pretty fast. But luckily there are easy and effective ways to making your ramen taste better and taste different.

A common method is cracking an egg into the noodles once they are done boiling. After you boil your noodles, drain most of the water out of the pot and then put the seasoning packet that came with the ramen into your noodles and mix it in. After this take the egg and crack it in the pot, put a lid on top and let the egg cook. You can break the yolk and mix it up in your noodles, or simply let the egg cook completely on top. After the egg is done cooking it will give your noodles a much more satisfying texture and even make them more filling.

“I always put an egg in my ramen noodles, it makes it feel more like a meal instead of a desperate snack,” Clayton Reed (’20) said.

Another way to add flavor to ramen, that is much easier than the egg, is adding spice. Thailand, Mexico, and India are all countries whose cultural foods heavily depend on spice to bring out the flavor in their dishes. Now adding spice into your ramen noodles is heavily subjective to how much spiciness you like and can handle. Cayenne Pepper Powder is an easy way to bring some heat to ramen noodles, but hot sauces like Cholula Brand Hot Sauce are possibilities as well.

“Ramen noodles are always too bland for me, so I have to make them super hot if I want a quick meal, or I won’t finish them,” Isaac Lagene (’20) said.

Basically there are no limits to what you can do with ramen noodles to make them taste better. You can always add slices of fried pork or beef into them so they are more like a traditional ramen, or add chives or carrots so they are more like a soup. The good thing about Ramen Noodles is that they are cheap, so if you do add an ingredient that disagrees with you, you can try something else and not ruin an entire dinner. If you are creative and committed enough, it can even be a fun past time during quarantine.