new noods

I saw these keto-ish noodles over at Justin's blog, so I was inspired to buy some for myself. The box arrived looking ripped-up (see the sad pic below; the box was inside a large, padded envelope and obviously got dinged around a lot), but the contents were undamaged. Not that it matters: Out of curiosity, I ate a one-serving package, and... I'm not sure how much I like these noodles, which are an unholy fusion of konjac and oat fiber.

In Korean, konjac is hangeulized as 곤약/gonyak, which means that Koreans pronounce the word like cognac. But according to the YouTube pronunciation guy, it's pronounced somewhere between "con Jack" and "cone Jack" in the West. So take your phonetic pick. The noodles can be eaten straight, no cooking, according to what it says on the box; they can even be pan-fried (which I might try next), boiled, or whatever. I tried them cold, which might not have been the best idea.They tasted funny, and the texture is like a combination of Korean dotori-muk/도토리묵 (acorn-starch jelly) and earlobe cartilage: there's a stiff, rubbery give to it, along with an unpleasantly cartilaginous texture when you bite through. Yeah, I definitely want to try frying these noodles up, but if you like cartilage, you'll be in heaven. I doubt they'll behave like rice noodles or Korean vermicelli pasta (dang-myeon/당면), but I hope that, when I fry them, they crisp up at least somewhat (a possible vision of the future here).

I had hoped to use these as a substitute for regular pasta for things like spaghetti, but I suspect that these noodles go a lot better with an Asian flavor profile.

So along with keto burgers, look out for some kind of Asian-ish preparation.