Ask HN: hacker culture and ramen

Could someone describe what is meant by US people when they talk about ramen as the proverbial cheap food for struggling entrepreneurs? I'm from the UK and I'm familiar with ramen as the tasty noodle soup you can get in Japanese restaurants. However I suspect people are usually referring to something else: is it simply dried noodles? Or something akin to the rather disgusting 'Pot Noodle' available in the UK and probably elsewhere, where you add boiling water to a plastic container holding noodles and unidentifiable chemical flavourings?

Yes, they come dried with these little powder sauce packets. Dump them into a dish with water, microwave and eat. You can have a meal for about 20 cents.

Thanks for the explanations! All is now clear. Yep, having to eat that would certainly make you work hard on your startup :-)

I don't think they're all that bad. Terribly unhealthy though. One packet is like 170% of your RDA for sodium.

I usually get the Chinese brands though (Nissin, Mama), which I think are a lot tastier than Ramen itself.

We used to mix peanut butter in to some of the flavors, delicious.