My kids just loved this meal and preparing the chicken in the slow cooker simplified the preparation and yielded a very tender and flavorful dish. You can always substitute asian noodles for the ramen, if you prefer, but there are a lot of very good brands of ramen noodles available now that are not overly saturated with chemicals. I adore the Chinese long beans, and try to incorporate them in my cooking whenever they are available in the market. If you can’t find them, you cold easily substitute snow peas or regular green beans.