![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ventaContinuing the relentless ongoing series of lunch-based posts...
I've been investigating shirataki noodles, one of the subgroups of what Bento Lady calls "the almost zero-calorie, weird wobbly food from Japan".
Now, the zero-calorie bit doesn't particularly appeal to me. I'm not really attempting to lose weight, and I have a bit of a superstitious dread of what I think of as subtitute foods - things which try to be like other things but with fewer calories/cabrohydrates etc. They always remind me of MEALS™, invented by Famine in Good Omens.
However, noodles containing no calories have got to be made of something, and in this case it's a particular kind of yam. The net result is that the noodles are made pretty much entirely of soluble fibre. Without wishing to subject you to an indelicate discourse about my digestive processes, I find that I have to eat a surprisingly high-fibre diet to remain functional. An easy way of shoehorning a bit of extra fibre into a lunchbox seemed like a pretty good idea.
In their natural state, shirataki noodles are indeed a bit weird and wobbly, they're also a scary semi-translucent white. Fortunately, thrown into a hot work with lots of soy sauce and vegetables, they soak up stuff and turn a much more food-like sort of colour. In and of themselves, they're not hugely exciting but mixed in with other things I think they work pretty well and add a bit of texture.
I had my noodles and vegetables with little burgers and some blanched spinach:
You'll notice my lunchbox is demonstrating its joie de vivre with a jaunty angle. You'll probably also notice that I really need to get the hang of photographing food better.
This is actually a bento from last week I didn't get around to posting. As suspected, with a lunch that packs better my teeny-tiny new bento box is indeed big enough.
I've been investigating shirataki noodles, one of the subgroups of what Bento Lady calls "the almost zero-calorie, weird wobbly food from Japan".
Now, the zero-calorie bit doesn't particularly appeal to me. I'm not really attempting to lose weight, and I have a bit of a superstitious dread of what I think of as subtitute foods - things which try to be like other things but with fewer calories/cabrohydrates etc. They always remind me of MEALS™, invented by Famine in Good Omens.
However, noodles containing no calories have got to be made of something, and in this case it's a particular kind of yam. The net result is that the noodles are made pretty much entirely of soluble fibre. Without wishing to subject you to an indelicate discourse about my digestive processes, I find that I have to eat a surprisingly high-fibre diet to remain functional. An easy way of shoehorning a bit of extra fibre into a lunchbox seemed like a pretty good idea.
In their natural state, shirataki noodles are indeed a bit weird and wobbly, they're also a scary semi-translucent white. Fortunately, thrown into a hot work with lots of soy sauce and vegetables, they soak up stuff and turn a much more food-like sort of colour. In and of themselves, they're not hugely exciting but mixed in with other things I think they work pretty well and add a bit of texture.
I had my noodles and vegetables with little burgers and some blanched spinach:
You'll notice my lunchbox is demonstrating its joie de vivre with a jaunty angle. You'll probably also notice that I really need to get the hang of photographing food better.
This is actually a bento from last week I didn't get around to posting. As suspected, with a lunch that packs better my teeny-tiny new bento box is indeed big enough.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2011-11-03 01:28 pm (UTC)I can't read any of the writing on the packet I have, though, as it's in Japanese :)
I see what you mean, though - I don't really understand how shirataki or konnyaku are made, or what sort of processing is done to yams to get to the end result.
As a fibre source they do seem effective, though. Apparently their nickname in Japanese translates as "a broom for the stomach"!