A little while back I realized my buying lunch out had gotten a touch out of hand. Read: daily. You see with a new little one we’ve been relying on some ready cook, or quick meals at home for dinner meaning less leftovers to come in the next day. So the last time we went grocery shopping, I decided to pick up some emergency lunches to keep in the desk. As we were walking down the isle, I somehow fondly remembered Ramen being “not bad.” I picked up two fancy Ramens, also known as Maruchan Instant Lunch. You know the ones, like in the picture. They come in an ever so Earth friendly Styrofoam cup and you pour boiling water in to sit and ‘cook’ for 3 minutes.

I suddenly remember now why I liked these in college. I WAS DRUNK. Clearly there is no other reasoning. Nothing I can come up with is redeeming about this stuff, well except for the warnings. Warning #1 “CAUTION: HOT!” A clear indicator this stuff is meant for inebriated college kids. Let’s break it down. The instructions clearly state pouring in the boiling water yourself. You only wait 3 minutes and it’s cooked. So in the 3 minutes this stuff is doing it’s thing, if you somehow forget you JUST POURED HOT WATER IN IT, clearly you must be drunk.

Warning #2 is a little more in depth and disturbing. It states (again in all caps, which I will ignore) “Handle with care especially when serving children.” Now they must mean if I were serving this up as a side to a nice plump Irish child because there is no way this stuff is suitable for consumption by a young child.

Lets delve in to the package and see what we find. As would be expected, a nice helping of noodles that if found in a video game, might be more than +2 rads. As if the noodles weren’t enough indigestible starch, they also give us a somewhat, kind of, kind of not, portion of kernels of corn. Just like Y, the sometimes vegetable ends up being a bit bland but is rounded out by a few shavings of carrot. Then comes the most disturbing part.

Shelf stable meat looking product.

See what I did there? I gave that it’s own paragraph. You know why? I wanted you to ponder that for a moment. This cup, needing no refrigeration has something, kind of resembling meat in it. I’m not sure it is meat. What I am sure of is it’s a little chewy, dark colored (my Maruchan was ‘beef’ flavored, more like salt flavored) and was a little like that skim coat on top of the gravy when you’ve left it on the table too long at thanksgiving.

So in conclusion as I sit and type and stare at the empty foam cup, I think back to the glory days of college and discover one more thing shattered. And that, at the time, had to have been my sobriety.