The lowest effort dandan noodles possible. This is a go-to for me (Walt) when I’m working from home and forget to eat lunch until 2:00 in the afternoon, and find I need something stat to get my blood sugar back up.
Ingredients
- 2 cloves garlic
- 1 pack instant ramen
- 1/2 the seasoning packet from the above ramen (I like Maruchan chicken or beef)
- A big spoonful of peanut butter (crunchy or smooth, sweetened or plain, whatever you like)
- A small spoonful of Lao Gan Ma Spicy Chili Crisp (or similar — I personally love the heat:msg:goodies ratio in this particular chili oil)
Add-Ons
- A dash of toasted sesame oil
- A dash of rice wine vinegar
- Everything bagel seasoning
Preparation
Let the faucet run until the water is as hot as it will get (this will save seconds or maybe even a minute of cook time… yes that lazy), then fill a pot or skillet with just enough hot water to cook the ramen. Put it on the stove on high, and bring to a boil.
While the water finishes heating, crush and mince the garlic and chuck it in the water to infuse and soften. You should have some time to wash and dry the knife/workspace before the water is done boiling to limit dishes.
Once boiling, add the ramen (but not the flavor packet) and cook according to package instructions. Save some of the pasta water as you drain the noodles and garlic. I typically do this by holding chopsticks at the edge of the pot to retain the noodles and pouring out the pasta water into a cup… because getting a colander or pasta strainer dirty and washing it would be too much effort.
Add the peanut butter, chili crisp, and 1/2 the ramen flavor packet to the drained noodles in the original pot. If using vinegar or sesame oil, add these too. Put a splash or two of warm, starchy pasta water back in to loosen the peanut butter and mix with chopsticks until homogeneous. The goal is saucy noodles, not clumped (too dry) or soupy (too wet). The sauce will thicken as it cools, so lean towards wetter.
If available, sprinkle everything bagel seasoning on top.
Eat the noodles out of the cooking pot using the same chopsticks.
Serves one… although I almost always get poachers looking for a bite or two.
Remarks
This recipe isn’t named after a real Dan. “Lazy Man Dan” is instead a spiritual figure when it comes to low effort bachelor chow, and to clarify this isn’t remotely trying to be authentic dandan. A friend introduced me to the term “bachelor chow” when he made me his recipe that epitomizes the genera:
Cooked quinoa with store-bought salsa poured on top, stirred up and eaten with a spoon.
As I’ve come define it, bachelor chow meets the following criteria:
- Low effort. <5 minutes of cooking time is ideal. Obviously with cooked quinoa the total time is more, but the active effort is probably <60 seconds total and a rice cooker makes it pretty unfuckupable. Low effort extends to the amount of dishes created, so it mostly one pot/pan meals, where the pot is also what I eat out of.
- It is a meal cooked from scratch. 100% prefab microwaveables or uncooked meals are disqualified because there isn’t anything funny to discuss. Bachelor chow largely exists as a whimsical lazy one-upmanship contest.
- Non-perishable/pantry staple ingredients. I should never have to go to the store, plan to make something from the genera, or worry that I need to use the ingredients before they go bad.
- Healthy-adjacent. I could live off a rotation of bachelor chow. It’s obviously not paleo-keto-whatever, but nor is it straight junk food.
The biggest question is:
“Why do you need to write up a recipe at all for bachelor chow? It’s pantry jazz.”
To which, I respond:
¯\_(ツ)_/¯