Food Review: Trader Joe’s Spring Onion Rice Noodle Soup Bowl

At a recent visit to **Trader Joe’s**, I purchased a *Spring Onion Rice Noodle Soup Bowl*. The packaging made it look like a step up from typical dried brick-style Ramen noodles. (Always note the words “Serving Suggestion” on packaging. There are no peas, corn, carrot shavings, baby corn, or basil leaves in the soup.) These soups come in their own bowl, which makes it easier to make (no dirty pots), and adds significantly to the waste. While one can conceivably keep the plastic bowl, there is a cardboard outer-package, the bowl is wrapped in plastic, there are three plastic-wrapped flavor-packets within the bowl, and these are wrapped in a larger plastic wrapper. Cardboard can usually be recycled, but my town does not want cardboard from food containers. The plastic bowl is [numbered 5][5], which my town does not recycle, and it doesn’t come with a lid, which makes it usefulness, after using it for the soup, limited.
But enough of the waste. How does it taste? Pretty good. Sweet for a soup. Peppery, too, which gives it a bit of zing. The noodles, despite what it looks like on packaging, are not long noodles. This soup must be eaten with a spoon. Those that like to ruin Ramen noodles by breaking up the brick will appreciate the length of these noodles; I, however, do not.
One problem with rice noodles is that they continue to suck up any liquid long after cooking. The instructions indicate that soup can be microwaved or cooked by adding boiling water. Either case, it takes about 3 minutes. That’s fast soup. But as the soup cools, the noodles increase in width until it’s hard to find any free liquid. The noodles never become too spongy in texture, though.
A clear benefit of this soup over Ramen noodles is the amount of fat. Like Ramen noodles, one package is two servings. Also like Ramen noodles, eating half of it is a joke. It does not keep well. But the entire package of *Spring Onion Rice Noodle Soup Bowl* is only 4g of fat (2g saturated), where a typical package of Ramen noodles is 14g of fat (7g saturated). It’s not much better sodium-wise, however: 1250mg vs 1600mg. Pre-packaged food rarely stacks up in this case. But I often add other flavorings to Ramen noodles, and I don’t have to with this one, so I’m still better off since I’m not adding more salt.
Finally, the other major difference is price. Ramen noodles can be found for little more that a dime per package. This bowl was 99¢. Not that big of a deal, but still, 900% more expensive. It would have been tough justifying this extravagance in college.
[5]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polypropylene