Ramen Noodle Re-do

I am teetering on the edge of finals week. I’ve written 35 pages worth of papers and I still have three more papers to go.

When I started to think about what I’d eaten this week, I honestly couldn’t remember what I’d been unceremoniously throwing down my hatch for the last seven days. Mostly I am just trying to feed my face, get it over with, and get back to my desk.

I was not-so-pleasantly reminded of exactly what I’ve been subsisting on when I took out the recycling this morning and came face to face with an embarrassing number of pizza boxes. (In my defense, we’d had a pizza study session the night before…but, really, they weren’t all from that). And when I transferred the sad, limp remnants of things that used to be green from my fridge to the trash, I got a glimpse of one too many ramen noodle wrappers taunting me from the bottom of the can.

So, yeah, I’ve been subsisting on caffeine, sodium, and mozzarella cheese for like a week. I am going to go out on a limb here and say that this is universally acknowledged to be bad. But, when you’re in grad school, and it’s exam week, this is kind of the reality.

Talking to my Mom on the phone this afternoon, she was (of course) unsurprised and yet duly horrified by my food intake for the last week. And, ever the Mom, she advised me: If you’re going to eat ramen, at least put some protein and vegetables in it.

I love this about my mama—she doesn’t make you feel guilty about eating crappy food. She always reminds me to take care of myself, but she’s realistic about the reality of time constraints, stress, and food vices (don’t let her loose around a bag of potato chips!)

Mom is, if nothing else, unfailingly real. If you’re gonna eat crap, (and real people are…forget you, Gwyneth and Giselle), Mom helps us find a more moderate, creative (dare I say healthier?) way to do it. Enter her inspired recipe for quick Asian chicken noodle soup.

So, I’m going to take some time to go to the store and buy a rotisserie chicken, a bag of bean sprouts, a bunch of cilantro and scallions, and a few other things to kick my ramen up a notch—and add a few vitamins and a little protein. (Oh yeah, and she made me promise to throw out the MSG-laden flavor packet.) Because Lord (and Mom) knows, I’m definitely going to eat more ramen this week, but at least I can do it with a little more dignity.