Instant Noodle Review: Should You Buy the Omsom Saucy Noodles?

When I learned Omsom’s sister founders Vanessa and Kim Pham had released a brand-new product, saucy noodles, I had to give them a try. 

The saucy noodles come in four varieties: chili sesame, garlic black pepper, soy garlic, and coconut lemongrass curry. Each one is curated by a professional chef who Omsom dubbed their “tastemakers.” 

A box comes with a serving of air-dried, knife-shaved noodles; they worked with a partner in the Fujian province in China to make them. All the noodles in the Saucy Noodle kits are the same, regardless of flavor. The box says the noodles will take four to six minutes to cook, and you can do so in the microwave, on the stovetop, or with boiling water.

We cooked the noodles on the stovetop for four minutes and thought they had the perfect medium width and thickness and were pleasantly chewy. They say each box serves two, but if you’re superhungry, we thought they were more of a meal for one. 

Each box also comes with a packet of sauce in one of the four flavors. Once your noodles are cooked, you just toss them with the sauce, and eat! 

We got the sampler box to try all four flavors. Here’s how we liked them. 

Chef Lucas Sin is the tastemaker of the chili sesame variation, inspired by dan dan noodles. A few of its ingredients include sesame paste, black vinegar, tamari, sugar, Sichuan peppercorn oil, sesame oil, garlic, and fermented broad bean paste. 

There was a noticeable amount of heat and tingly sensation from the Sichuan peppercorns, but it wasn’t overpowering. The sauce was very tangy and the sesame paste and oil added a nutty backbone. “I could see myself enjoying these at home for sure,” one taster said.

The garlic black pepper noodles were curated by tastemaker Chef Helen Nguyen and are based on Vietnamese-American garlic butter noodles. To get that buttery flavor in the sauce, they use butter powder, in addition to tamari, fish sauce, garlic, sugar, and black pepper. 

The butter powder is very evident, and tasters remarked that the sauce was creamy and thick. While we enjoyed the richness, the thickness of the sauce made it harder to toss with the noodles. There was a bit of pleasant funkiness due to the fish sauce, but some tasters found these noodles to be overly salty. 

Omsom’s soy garlic noodles, a riff on Chinese sizzling oil noodles, are by tastemakers Ewa and Jeromy Ko. Aside from the soy sauce and garlic, the sauce also has herbs such as scallions and cilantro, ginger, white pepper, and Sichuan peppercorn oil. 

Although tasters enjoyed the subtle heat and herbs, they felt it was too subtle. One taster was hoping for a deeper savory flavor and another commented it was “unspecific.”

A riff on the flavors of khao soi, the coconut lemongrass curry noodles are from tastemakers Chefs Chaht Suansilphong and Dustin Everett of Fish Cheeks and Gai. The sauce is packed with ingredients such as coconut milk, galangal, curry paste, fish sauce, garlic, and Thai chili flakes. 

While the citrusy, herbaceous, coconutty flavor was great, it was a bit too weak and we wished it was a bit bolder.

Overall, the noodles themselves were perfectly chewy and satisfying, although the portions were a bit small. They cook in just four minutes, making them ideal for a weekday lunch or last-minute dinner.

If you like the Omsom sauces, you’ll probably like the Saucy Noodles too, but we found some varieties to be more flavorful than others. 

• BUY the Chili Sesame. If you’re sensitive to spice, it might be a bit hot, but we loved the numbing, tingling flavor of the Sichuan peppercorn. It was perfectly balanced by the acid of the black vinegar.
• TAKE OR LEAVE the Garlic Black Pepper. Some tasters loved the nutty, creamy flavor of the garlic black pepper noodles, while some found the sauce too thick. 
• SKIP the Soy Garlic. We found this variation to be too subtle and lacking in savory punch. 
• TAKE OR LEAVE the Coconut Lemongrass Curry. Tasters immediately recognized this as khao soi-inspired and enjoyed the freshness of the lemongrass, but overall, thought this sauce was underseasoned. A pinch of salt would do the trick.