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What college student hasn’t eaten ramen? Don’t be ashamed, you know you’ve done it. I certainly have. Sometimes it was because there was a huge blizzard and I didn’t want to walk to the caf. Sometimes my fiance was visiting and I didn’t want to buy him dinner. Sometimes I was just really lazy. But since those days, I have moved into clean eating. What to do for those nights when I just want an easy meal?

There is actually an easy solution for your ramen woes. You will need a source of boiling water, a mini fridge with a freezer and ice cube tray, and your pasta and sauce of choice.

“Ramen Packet”

The wonderful thing about ramen for college students is that it is easy, single serving, and it keeps. But have you read the ingredients on that seasoning packet?! yet with clean, homemade dishes and sauces…they don’t last so long. Who here has opened a jar of pasta sauce that has been used once to find it moldy? This girl has.

Pasta is easy enough to cook up in single servings. Sauce, one the other hand, is not. It takes time, equipment, and is usually prepared in large batches. Luckily, there is a super easy, but often overlooked, solution! All you need is a sauce of your choice and a freezer.

If you have ever done any batch cooking, you are probably familiar with freezing sauces for use later on. But here is a little trick: freeze the sauce in ice cube trays. You can do this with either store bought sauce or homemade sauce. Once the sauce is frozen solid, place the cubes into a labeled freezer bag.

These cubes will keep for months and now allow you to only thaw exactly how much sauce you need!

Putting it all together

Once you have your sauce cubes, the rest is easy. Simply boil water in your hot pot (or whatever you use), and add the amount of pasta desired. Cook to desired consistency, about 8-10 minutes, stirring periodically.

Depending on what kind of hot pot you have, you may be able to simply place or fork or spoon over the spout to drain the water. If you are cooking long noodles, you can also pull them out with a fork. If you choose to drain the water, either immediately remove the pasta or add the sauce to prevent it from burning to the bottom.

The sauce cubes will work best if melted ahead of time (just don’t leave them out too long!). The meal will stay warmer if you mix the sauce and pasta together in the hot pot (turned off). However, if you are as lazy as I am, you may decide you can stomach luke warm pasta over having to clean your hot pot!

What do you think? What sauces and noodle combinations would you use this for? I like using spaghetti with pesto or marinara cubes!

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