Trader Joe’s Miso Instant Ramen Soup Review

Trader Joe's Miso Instant Ramen Soup

It probably comes as no surprise that Trader Joe’s is extremely popular with our readers. The company has a killer lineup of frozen food, after all, and they top that off with excellent customer service and great prices. So here at Freezer Meal Frenzy, we try to review as much Trader Joe’s frozen food as we possibly can. We believe our readers appreciate and deserve that sort of content. We also love writing Trader Joe’s reviews, because we get to sample so many of their tasty food items.

Unfortunately, with COVID-19 restrictions in place, it’s been a bit more difficult for us to make our routine runs to Trader Joe’s. Even when we get out there, the freezer section tends to be extremely picked over. That means we’ve been reviewing less of their frozen food than usual. However, we did discover the Trader Joe’s Miso Instant Ramen Soup, and we really wanted to check it out. It might not be frozen, but it’s an interesting item that comes from the shelf at Trader Joe’s, and we’re really curious about how it tastes.

So we hope you can find it in your hearts to forgive us for reviewing a non-frozen food item today. (We should point out that we’ve also reviewed the Chicken Ramen Soup, which is also not frozen.)

Trader Joe's Miso Instant Ramen Soup

When you open up the package, you’ll find some noodles inside, along with a packet of seasoning and a packet of oil, as shown in the image above.

The heating instructions are fairly simple. You really just need to empty the oil and seasoning packets into the cup, fill the container to the fill line with boiling water, and let it sit for six minutes. Be sure to give it a good stir before you dig in. If you don’t want to pre-boil your water, you can add room-temperature water and stick this in the microwave for a minute and a half, then let it sit for six minutes. It’s all pretty simple. (If you want to read the instructions directly off the package, check out the package photographs at the bottom of this review.)

If you want to get wild with this, you can add a hardboiled egg, some seaweed, or some green onions. We think all of those sound lovely, but for the sake of this review, we decided to eat this ramen as is. (We also ran out of eggs when we made the Jimmy Dean Sausage Skillet the other day.) We did, however, transfer our ramen from the cup to a bowl so we could get a better picture of it once it was done.

Trader Joe's Miso Instant Ramen Soup

We should point out that even after the six minutes are up, the noodles tend to clump together aggressively. We found ourselves pulling them apart with our fingers, then letting this sit for a few extra minutes before digging in. Even so, our noodles were a little rubbery and hard to chew. They also taste a little bit like a pencil eraser.

The broth, however, is pretty decent. It’s thicker than you might expect, considering it’s almost all water, and it has a nice flavor. It’s a little oily, but that’s not a bad thing. Overall, the broth is pretty tasty, which is good because this meal is mostly broth. (You might also find a few squares of dried seaweed mixed in, and that’s a lovely touch.)

One cup of this stuff contains 180 calories and 860 mg of sodium. It’s not the calories that will get you; it’s the sodium. This little cup of ramen is a sodium machine. It’s also not very filling, so after eating this, you might end up back in the kitchen to grab a snack.

The Trader Joe’s Miso Instant Ramen Soup isn’t amazing, but it’s better than the cheap packets you’d get for a quarter at the grocery store. Of course, we’d prefer going out to a Japanese restaurant and eating a real bowl of ramen to making it at home, but this will do when you’re craving ramen and can’t afford to go out (or if your favorite Japanese restaurant is closed for COVID lockdown). We would love to add some egg to this the next time we cook it to see how much that would improve it — we think it would make this much, much better.

To learn more about the nutrition content, ingredients, or cooking instructions for this Trader Joe’s dry ramen, check out our carton photos below.

Trader Joe's Miso Instant Ramen Soup
Trader Joe's Miso Instant Ramen Soup
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Lydia
Lydia
1 year ago

I’m thinking of becoming a vegetarian, plus I love ramen, so this was a great review for me!

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