Mac and Cheese Ramen: A Must-Have Cheesy Food

Two bricks of instant ramen, a real roux based cheese sauce, and about fifteen minutes. This is Mac and Cheese Ramen, and it is the cheapest comfort food on this whole site.

Hey, food lovers! It's Genio, and this one is exactly what it sounds like. You cook two packets of instant noodles, you make a proper cheese sauce in a second pot, and you put them together. No cheese slice melted on top, no sad orange powder pretending to be sauce.

The pack in the photo below is Shin Ramyun, which is what this was cooked with. Any instant noodle works. The one thing worth knowing before you start is that the seasoning packet inside those noodles is doing a lot of the flavour work here, so do not throw it out with the wrapper.

A Roux Based Sauce, Not a Melted Cheese Slice

Most instant ramen cheese hacks are a slice of processed cheese dropped into the hot broth. That gives you cheesy soup. This is the other thing: butter and flour cooked into a roux, milk and cream whisked in, then cheddar and mozzarella melted off the heat. It is the same sauce that goes into a tray of baked mac and cheese, just made in ten minutes in a small saucepan.

Why bother with the extra pot? Because a roux holds. A sauce built on flour and milk stays glossy and clings to the noodles instead of splitting into oil and stringy cheese the moment it cools. The mozzarella is in there for the stretch, the cheddar is in there for the flavour, and the quarter cup of cream is what stops it tasting floury.

If you want the fast version instead, ramen carbonara gets to a creamy sauce with egg yolks and parmesan and no roux at all, in a single pot.

What You Need, and What to Do With the Second Seasoning Packet

Everything here is supermarket basics. Serves two.

The noodles

• Instant ramen noodles, 2 packages. Both noodle blocks go in the pot. Shin Ramyun is what the photos show, but any brand works.
• Ramen seasoning, 1 packet. This is the sachet from inside one of those two packets, not a separate thing you buy. It is the salt and the umami in this sauce. You will have a second packet spare, so keep it for five minute miso ramen or for spicy garlic ramen, which only uses half of one.

The cheese sauce

• Butter, 3 tbsp. Melted first, and the base of the roux.
• Plain flour, 1.5 tbsp. Cooked into the butter for a minute or two so the sauce thickens without tasting raw.
• Milk, 300ml. The bulk of the sauce.
• Heavy cream, ¼ cup. Thickened cream in the photo, which is the Australian version of the same thing. It is what makes the sauce rich rather than just thick.
• Cheddar, grated, 50g. The flavour.
• Mozzarella, grated, 50g. The stretch. Grate both yourself if you can be bothered, since pre grated cheese is dusted with starch to stop it clumping and that starch can make a sauce grainy.
• Mustard, 1 tbsp. The one ingredient people skip and should not. See the note under the steps, because the recipe card lists it and then never tells you where it goes.

On top

• Spring onions. Sliced thin. The only green thing in the bowl and it does cut the richness.
• Chili oil. Spooned over at the end, flakes and all.
• Soft boiled eggs, optional. Halved, yolks still runny in every photo on this page.
• Fried Spam, optional. Cut thick and browned hard in a dry pan. Four slices is what is in the bowl above.

How to Make Mac and Cheese Ramen, Step by Step

Two pots, six steps. Put the noodle water on first and make the sauce while it comes up to the boil, and the whole thing lands in about fifteen minutes.

1. Boil the noodles. Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to the boil and cook both noodle blocks to the time on the packet. Drain and set aside. Go light on the salt here, because the seasoning packet and the two cheeses are already bringing plenty.

2. Make the roux. In a saucepan over medium heat, melt the butter. Once it has stopped foaming, add the flour and stir constantly for 1 to 2 minutes. It will look like wet sand and then start to bubble. That bubbling is the point, it is the flour cooking out, so do not rush it.

3. Add the milk and cream. Pour the milk in slowly, whisking the whole time, then the cream. Slowly is doing the work in that sentence. Dump it all in at once and you get lumps that no amount of whisking later will fix. Keep going until it is smooth and just thick enough to coat the back of a spoon.

4. Melt the cheese off the heat. As soon as it simmers, turn the heat off. Then add the cheddar and the mozzarella and stir until they disappear into the sauce. The residual heat in the pan is enough. This is the step that decides whether your sauce is silky or grainy.

5. Season the sauce. Stir in the ramen seasoning packet and the tablespoon of mustard. This is the photo below, and it is where both of them belong: in the sauce, while it is still loose enough to mix properly.

6. Noodles in, and serve. Tip the drained noodles into the sauce and fold until every strand is coated. Into bowls, then spring onions, chili oil, and the eggs and Spam if you are doing them.

One thing to know about the recipe card below. It lists the mustard in the ingredients and then does not mention it in any of its five steps, and it puts the seasoning packet in at the very end, after the noodles. The photos on this page show both going into the sauce first, which is easier because loose sauce mixes and coated noodles do not. Follow the steps above.

Why the Mustard Matters More Than It Sounds

A tablespoon of mustard in a cheese sauce does not make it taste of mustard. What it does is cut through the fat. You have 3 tablespoons of butter, 100g of cheese and a quarter cup of cream in one small pot, and without something sharp in there the whole bowl goes flat and heavy after about five mouthfuls. The acid in the mustard is what keeps you eating.

It also helps the sauce physically. Mustard is a mild emulsifier, which is a long word for the thing that keeps fat and liquid holding hands instead of separating. Plain yellow mustard, Dijon, whatever is in the fridge door. The photo above shows it going in as two soft dollops straight onto the sauce.

Keeping the Sauce Smooth, and the Noodles Chewy

Heat off before the cheese. Cheese is fat held in protein. Push it past a simmer and the protein squeezes tight, the fat runs out, and you get an oily pan with rubbery strings in it. Nothing brings that back. Turning the burner off and letting the residual heat do the melting costs you nothing and removes the only way this recipe can really fail.

Pull the noodles early. They keep cooking in the hot sauce after you drain them, so take them out while they still have some bite. Instant ramen goes from chewy to mush in about a minute, and once it is mush the dish is just cheese soup.

Fix the thickness with milk, not heat. Too thick, splash in more milk off the heat and stir. Too thin, put it back on the lowest flame for a minute before the cheese goes in, never after. Thickening it after the cheese is in means heating the cheese, which is the one thing you were avoiding.

What Goes on Top

The bowl in the photos has four toppings on it, and each one is doing a job.

• Soft boiled eggs. Six and a half to seven minutes from boiling, then straight into cold water. The yolks in these photos are set at the edge and still liquid in the middle, and that yolk running into the sauce is half the reason to bother.
• Fried Spam. Thick slices, dry pan, high heat, no oil needed because it renders its own. You want the dark caramelised edges you can see on the slices above. If you want to do something better with the rest of the can, spam teriyaki glazes it in soy, mirin, sake and brown sugar.
• Chili oil. Spooned over so you get the flakes and the sediment, not just the oil. This is the only heat in the bowl unless your seasoning packet is a spicy one.
• Spring onions. Raw, sliced thin, piled in the middle. Do not skip them for a dish this rich.

Eat it straight away. This is not a dish that waits. A roux sauce firms up as it cools and instant noodles keep drinking it, so a bowl left for twenty minutes is a solid block. If you do have leftovers, reheat them in a pan over low heat with a good splash of milk and keep stirring.

Frequently Asked Questions

What do I do with the second seasoning packet?

You open two noodle packets and the recipe only uses one sachet, so there is always a spare. Keep it in the cupboard. It is good stirred through fried rice, sprinkled on roast potatoes or hot chips, or used as the base of a quick soup. Spicy garlic ramen only calls for half a packet, so one spare covers two batches of it.

How do I make it spicier?

Start by checking what you already have. The Shin Ramyun packet in the ingredients photo is a spicy seasoning, so that version arrives with some heat built in. If you are using a plain chicken or beef flavoured noodle, the chili oil on top is doing all of it, and you can add more of it, or stir sriracha or a pinch of cayenne straight into the sauce before the noodles go in.

Can I use different cheeses?

Yes, as long as you keep the split. You want one cheese for flavour and one that melts smoothly, which is what the cheddar and mozzarella are doing. Gouda, gruyere or pepper jack can stand in for the cheddar. Avoid anything hard and dry on its own, since parmesan alone will go gritty in a sauce this thin.

My sauce went too thick. Can I save it?

Easily. Add milk a splash at a time over low heat, stirring between each one, until it loosens. Add it slowly, because a sauce that has gone thin again cannot be rescued the same way once the cheese is already in it.

Can I make it in the microwave?

The noodles, yes. Cook them in a microwave safe bowl of water and drain. The sauce is a stovetop job, because a roux needs constant stirring and a microwave cannot give you that. If you only have a microwave, melt the butter, whisk in the flour and then the milk, and go in thirty second bursts, whisking hard after every one.

Can I make it ahead?

Not assembled. You can make the cheese sauce up to two days ahead and keep it covered in the fridge, then warm it gently with a splash of milk while the noodles boil. Noodles that have sat in sauce overnight come out soft, so cook those fresh.

Is this a healthy meal?

No, and it is not trying to be. The recipe card puts a serving at 729 calories, 48.2g of fat and 2308.1mg of sodium, and most of that sodium is the seasoning packet and the cheese. Treat it as the comfort food it is. If you want to take the edge off, use half the seasoning packet, wilt a couple of handfuls of spinach into the sauce, and skip the Spam.

What else can I add to it?

Crispy bacon, shredded leftover chicken or sauteed mushrooms all work, stirred through at the end so they do not thin the sauce. Anything you would put on a tray of baked macaroni and cheese belongs here too, and crushed hot corn chips scattered over at the last second is a genuinely good one. Add wet ingredients sparingly, because anything watery will loosen a sauce built to this thickness.

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Mac and Cheese Ramen: A Must-Have Cheesy Food

Print Recipe

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3.8 from 4 reviews

Try this creamy Mac and Cheese Ramen recipe—quick, cheesy, and the ultimate comfort food fusion. Perfect for a delicious, easy meal!

• Author: Genio Ng
• Prep Time: 5
• Cook Time: 10
• Total Time: 15
• Yield: 2 1x
• Category: Main Course / Comfort Food
• Method: Stovetop / Quick & Easy
• Cuisine: Fusion / Asian-Inspired

Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

Ingredients

• 2 packages of Instant Ramen Noodles
• 3 tbsp of butter
• 1.5 tbsp of all purpose flour
  300ml of milk
  ¼ cup of heavy cream
  50g of cheddar cheese, grated
  50g of of Mozzarella Cheese, grated
• 1 packet of ramen seasoning
• 1 tbsp of mustard

Toppings

• Spring onions
• Chili oil
• Soft boiled eggs (optional)
• Fried Spam (optional)

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Instructions

1. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil and cook the noodles according to package instructions. Strain it and set aside.
2. In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat. Once it is fully melted, add in your flour. Stir and cook constantly for about 1-2 minutes.
3. Then, slowly pour in milk and heavy cream and whisk until it is smooth and lightly thickened.
4. Once it simmers, turn off the heat and add the cheddar and Mozzarella cheese. Mix until it is fully melted and incorporated.
5. Add ramen into your sauce sauce and mix until it is fully coated. Season with 1 ramen seasoning packet, serve and enjoy!

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Genio Ng

Hi there, I'm Genio. I really appreciate you taking your time and visiting me here. As an international student from Indonesia coming to Sydney right after Covid lockdown - it was challenging for me to make friends and find myself in a new city. I've never cooked before but I found my passion in food content creation and testing Asian inspired recipes - I learnt that cooking can be incredibly easy, cheap and fun so I'm super happy to be able to share this with you! Please come by my socials and say Hi - always keen to make new friends! Genio

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