Wai Wai Oriental Flavour

This is the third Wai Wai noods I've had. Like the others I like the noodles, and I like the flavouring (this one is very yummy, with good onion flavours), but it's just a bit hot for my palate. It's not a sharp empty chilli heat such as I've encountered from some cheap Asian noods, this one is an integrated warmth that invigorates and enlivens the soup base. It's just too damn hot for me, so I sweat and burn, looking for water to cool my mouth down. If only they made a less hot version I would be a happy man!

Made in Thailand with veggie ingredients.

Date: Dec 2016  Score: 5

Tried again. Madness. Too freaking hot man!  And there's not much here. And the flavour really wasn't worth the burn.

Date: May 2017  Score: 1

Lucky Me! Pancit Canton Original Flavour

O dear. I've had some Lucky Me! in March last year and didn't like them. This is the original flavour (which some folks in the Philippines, where these noods are made, are complaining doesn't taste like the original flavour any more), and it's dreadful stuff. These are really among the worse noods I've had. The flavouring is unpleasant, and the noodles are like old string. The RamenRater guy likes them, but its each to their own, and I do notice that we don't have the same taste. I don't think it has anything to do with him getting sent free samples from the company.

Made by the Monde Nissin Corporation which was founded in the Philippines in 1980 by Betty Ang. There is "chicken flavour" but no actual meat. The name means stirred or fried noodles (pancit is noodles) which roughly translates as chow mein.

Score: 1

***

Best instant noodle chow mein

The best (and worse) 

Chicken flavour instant noodles

Tom Yum Taste Test - Nissin v Mama

I quite like Mama noods, and I also like Tom Yum, which is a thin, spicy soup that originated in Thailand, where Mama are based. The soup is typically flavoured with lemongrass, lime and chilli. My favourite Mama noods are their Tom Yum flavours.

My favourite noods company is Nissin, so when I picked up a packet of Nissin Demae Ramen Thai Tom Yum I thought it would be interesting to  compare my current favourite Tom Yum noods with a Tom Yum from my favourite noods company.

Quess what? Yes, Nissin won easily. The flavours were crisper, sharper, fresher and more natural tasting. The noodles were spot on. The combination of great flavouring with perfect noodles makes for a totally yummy mouth experience. The Mama Tom Yum, which up to that point had constantly thrilled me, seemed artificial, cloying and overpowering by contrast. By themselves they would still be very yummy, but when eaten straight after the Nissin noods, the difference is plain to taste.

Winner: Nissin Demae Ramen Thai Tom Yum

Nissin Demae Ramen Thai Tom Yum

MAMA Tom Yum Pork Flavour

Nissin Demae Ramen Thai Tom Yum

These are awesome. Nissin do what other noods companies can only dream and hope of doing. Nissin have the years of experience, knowledge and infrastructure to make the world's greatest instant noodles. This is perfect Tom Yum - warmly spicy, with exciting lime and lemongrass flavours, and the noodles are unbelievable - just the right balance of firmness and yielding softness, they have a satisfying texture, and are able to pick up and hold the sauce. Veggie.  I don't think it is possible to achieve a better instant version of Tom Yum noodles.

Score: 10

Most yummy Tom Yum

Nifty Nissin noodles

Triple Chicken Taste Test

We put these three cheap chicken chaps to the taste test face off today. Initially the Sunrise one tasted  just too full of crude MSG to really compare - that quickly fell by the wayside.  The normal Asda chicken is made in China with dead chickens so that didn't please anyone. Added to which, though it had a tender and subtle flavour, there was too much noodle to seasoning, so the overall impression was bland. That left the Asda Smart Price chicken, made in China - ah, also with dead chicken powder. So, I really need to remember to check Asda's noodles. At one time Asda was a good veggie supermarket, with its own range of Wot No Meat veggie meals. But they stopped doing that, and then cut back on the Linda McCartney veggie brand, so we stopped shopping there. I still have a fond soft spot for Asda, but I think things changed for the worse when they were taken over by the American owned Wal-Mart company.

Anyway, the Asda noods were a little bland, and contained chicken, so the MSG drenched Sunrise wins by a technical knock-out.


Golden Sunrise Instant Noodles Roast Chicken Flavour  Score: 3
Asda Chosen By You Chicken Flavour Noodles     Score: 3
Asda Smart Price Chicken Flavour Instant Noodles         Score: 2

The best (and worse) Chicken flavour instant noodles

Golden Sunrise Instant Noodles Roast Chicken Flavour

Lots of MSG. Too chemical tasting for my liking, and way too intense on the MSG.


Date:  Jan, 2016   Score: 3

This is horrid stuff, it really is. Salty and chemical tasting. It's really hard to eat a whole pack without doing something to make it edible (we mixed in a pack of Super Noodle Chicken).


Date: July, 2017   Score: 1

The best (and worse) Chicken flavour instant noodles

Nongshim OoLongmen Chicken Flavour

This appears to be an improved version of the Chicken Poulet which curiously contained beef extract. This new version is all veggie, but is still not very good. I mean, it's edible, but it just has an unpleasant chemical flavour all the way through, and the noodles are too floury. There's lumps of soy which are intended to be beef. It's an odd concoction, with unpleasant textures. I'll try them again in the future out of curiosity, but it's not really a noodle I'm going to be reaching for in my cupboard.

Score: 3

Nongshim

The best (and worse) 
Chicken flavour noodles

Golden Sunrise BBQ Beef v Lidl Newgate BBQ Beef

A Lidl BBQ Beef noodle v a 99p shop BBQ Beef noodle. The Golden Sunrise is the 99p shop brand, and costs 20p for a 70g pack. I reviewed it in Sept 2016, and gave it a score of 6. The Newgate is the Lidl brand, and costs 35p for a 108g pack. I reviewed it in 2015 under the Vitasia name and again in May 2016 under the Newgate name when I gave it a score of 4.

The Lidl noods are little more expensive weight for weight, but look a little more attractive in the bowl, and have a slightly more attractive packet. The taste though really is the main difference, and it's quite staggering. The Lidl noods are simply stodgy, plain and boring. There is too much noodle for the flavouring, and the flavouring simply lacks impact. The Golden Sunrise noods have bags of flavour - perhaps too much. There's a bit of spicy warmth, but also a fair degree of msg. Just a tad too much. Bags of savoury, but pushed just a tad too far so it all tastes just a bit too chemical and false.

We mixed them together and that produced a fairly acceptable if not particularly exciting lunch.


The winner is the Golden Sunrise.

Lidl Curry v Asda Curry

The Lidl (Newgate) is a larger pack

Head to head with two own brand curry noods. The Lidl own brand is called Newgate, which is misleading, but at least it has more noodles - 108g compared to Asda's 85g.

Ingredients are much the same, except that the Asda contains crushed dried chicken. The Asda is made in China - the Lidl doesn't give country of origin.

The dried noodles look more attractive in the Asda pack, while the seasoning pack (and the seasoning itself) looks more attractive in the Lidl pack.

The Lidl has plumper noodles, and this meant that the noodle wheat flavour tended to be slightly more prominent than the sauce. The Asda noods seemed more integrated. But, really, there is little in it. The flavours are very similar. I slightly preferred the Asda, my partner slightly preferred the Lidl. Given that the Asda contains chicken, I declare the Lidl noods the winner.


*  Lidl Newgate / Vitasia Instant Noodles Curry Flavour

*  ASDA Chosen By You Curry Flavour Noodles (packet)

Itsu What The Duck Crystal Noodles (Cup)

The sauce makes for a pleasant savoury drinking soup, while the noodles are best thrown away.


Score: 4

Ko-Lee Bang! Bang! Noodles Cheeky Chicken Green Curry Flavour

I like this. Warm, but not too spicy, with a pleasant touch of lime. The sauce works well with the noodles, and I didn't need to add any salt or seasoning. I put in all the sauces, and it worked well. A little watery, but that's OK sometimes. Drinking the sauce afterwards was a nice way to finish it off, though the design of the cup makes it just a little tricky.


Score: 7

Kohlico

Best curry flavour

Ko-Lee Bang! Bang! Noodles Ruby Murray Curry Flavour

Chewy noodles and a thin sauce, but decent enough. I like the packaging, and the contents are OK, though could do with more flavour. I'm happy enough to eat these, but there are better curry noods around, and at lower prices.


Score: 4

Kohlico

Best curry flavour instant noodles

Ko-Lee Bang! Bang! Noodles Chicken Feel Good Flavour

There is a Bang Bang Chicken recipe popular in China, and I wonder if that is the source behind the name for this new series of pot noods.  On opening the pot and finding three flavour sachets I felt that was a lot of fuss for a quick convenience meal, but in the end it was quick and easy to prepare. I did put in the chilli seasoning as it didn't taste too hot on my tonguw, and true enough the noods didn't burn me, but I've still ended up sweating, and if I have this again I'll leave the chilli out. Chilli often tends to dominate any meal flavours anyway. A little goes a very long way!

I'm not sure if this is veggie. The ingredients list is a bit vague - it says "Chicken Seasoning Flavour (Soy sauce, Onion powder, Chicken Flavour (NI))" - make of that what you will. I've found out what  NI means - it is "Nature Identical", another word for synthetic. So this is veggie.

I quite liked this. The noodles were a bit wiry, and the sauce was a bit thin so not clinging to the noodles so it was essentially eating the noodles then drinking the liquid left in the pot, but it was OK.


Score: 5

The best (and worse) Chicken flavour instant noodles

Ko-Lee Bang! Bang! Noodles Bangkok Nice 'N' Spicy Flavour

Easy to make, and a fun looking cup, but the noodles were like thin wire, and the sauce was watery with a flavour that is best described as hot tomato. I didn't use the hot flavouring sauce, yet this still ended up being very hot. Uncomfortable to eat, and now I have heart burn! Not impressed.


Score: 3

Kohlico

Pot Noodle Sweet & Sour

Normally a £1, this is on offer at 50p in Asda, so I grabbed a few. I like Pot Noodle anyway. This is easy to make, and has a typical sweet and sour sauce. It works well. If you like sweet and sour and re-hydrated veg, then this will be to your taste. I found it edible, but the unremitting sticky sweetness (though balanced by pleasant acidity) became a little one-dimensional. OK though.


Date: Oct 2016  Score: 4

The best of the Pot Noodle slags

Pot Noodle V Asda Noodle Snack: Beef & Tomato

Pot Noodle v Asda in a head to head. Pot Noodle is normally £1 a pot, while Asda is less than half that price, though the Pot Noodles were being offered at half price, so I grabbed some.

Ingredients. Asda on the left, Pot Noodle on the right

Both are veggie, using onion as flavouring and soya for the beef. Asda use herbs, which made a difference in the taste. Asda wasn't a great tasting pot, but it was streets ahead of the Pot Noodle which was bland to the extreme.

Open the lid and check the contents

The packaging is fairly similar, though Pot Noodle has the stronger appearance both in the label and on opening the pot. The Pot Noodle cup appears to be over flowing with goodness, it has some writing on the inside of the lid, and the sauce sachet is bolder and better looking. The anticipation and expectation for the Pot Noodle is much greater, especially with all the clever advertising. Asda Noodle Snack, of course, has 0 advertising, so the expectation is that it's going to be crap, and the appearance on opening the lid confirms that. It all looks pale and cheap next to the glorious Pot Noodle.

Pour and stir

Pour on the boiling water and stir. The Pot Noodle has a solid cake of noodles which makes it hard to stir. The Asda noodles are slightly easier to prepare. There is more vivid colour in the PotNoodle sauce, but as both soften and cook, there isn't a lot to choose between them. They both have bits of dried veg in the sauce, and after a while, if anything, the Asda noodles look more appetising. Put on the tomato sauce. Both sauces are thick and dark. And when eating the pots, both sauces were sweet, rich, and with a pleasant tomato flavour.

Asda was the clear winner with those herbs, but neither were worth the money.,

Asda Beef & Tomato Flavour Noodle Snack

Pot Noodle Beef &Tomato

Asda Beef & Tomato Flavour Noodle Snack

There's some herbs. It's a decent enough pot snack. Better than the Pot Noodle it's clearly trying to copy. Bits of fried veg, and a thick and tasty tomato sauce. But on the whole lacks interest and flavour. Veggie.


Date: Oct 2016  Score: 3

***

Beef flavoured

ASDA Noodles

Pot Noodle V Asda Noodle Snack:
Beef & Tomato