This Poor Man's Ramen Pizza Is The Comfort Food Mashup We've Been Craving

Step aside, English muffin pizzas (although, not too far aside, we still love you). When ramen meets pizza, the best of both worlds collide. Here at Tasting Table, we've explored countless ways to hack your instant ramen, including the viral ginger ale ramen trick that actually works. Now, we're back with another tip to take your late-night bite to the next level: Turn ramen into a quick, easy, and comforting pizza crust.

To make this saucy, savory supernova, grab a packet of ramen, and boil it just until the noodles start to become bendy. Two ramen packets is the ideal amount to make a personal-sized pizza. Then, heat a few tablespoons of oil in a wide, oven-safe skillet, and toss in your (drained) ramen. For extra crispiness, allow the pan to preheat before adding the noodles, and if you have a cast iron skillet, bust it out.

Using a spatula, shape and firmly press the ramen into a compact puck layer, and allow it to fry in the oil for a few minutes. From there, simply load up your go-to pizza toppings — sauce, shredded cheese, even a few slices of pepperoni — and transfer the whole thing into the oven to bake and become firm. Around 20 minutes at 450 degrees Fahrenheit should do the trick. Just slice it into triangles and enjoy. The assembled pie looks like a totally normal pizza until flipped upside-down, revealing the squiggly noodle texture beneath.

At first, using instant ramen to make a pizza crust might seem a little far-fetched. But, ramen noodles themselves are made from some combination of water, salt, wheat flour, and kansui, a type of alkaline mineral water loaded with sodium carbonate or potassium carbonate. The kansui creates ramen's signature yellow hue and textural chewiness. Beyond the kansui, the other three ingredients in ramen (flour, salt, and water) also happen to be the building blocks of most homemade pizza crusts, making those noodles a natural fit for creating a crisp bite with a moist, chewy interior. Plus, the noodles' wiggly shape makes them extra apt at holding onto all the savory sauce and gooey melted cheese. It's a neo-comfort food classic that's somehow even greater than the sum of its parts. Pro tip: Adding a layer of shredded cheese underneath the sauce layer helps prevent the ramen from soaking up too much sauce and becoming soggy.

With just a little sauce and cheese, ramen pizza can be the ultimate cure for the munchies. Or, other elevated toppings like pepperoncini, aged grated Parmesan, prosciutto, a swipe of fig jam, pickled eggplant, or pan-seared guanciale are also fair game. If you're feeling especially ambitious at snack time, we've put together a thorough guide for pairing wine with your pizza.