Vietnamese Beef Pho – Phở Bò

Phở Bò – Vietnamese Beef with Noodles

Yield: 8 Servings (4 Quarts)

Ingredients (For the Broth)
2 medium Yellow Onions (about 1 pound)
4-inch piece Ginger (about 4 ounces)
5-6 lbs. Beef Soup Bones (marrow and knuckle bones preferred)
10 Star Anise
12 whole Cloves
½ teaspoon Fennel Seeds
3-inch Cinnamon stick
2 black Cardamom
1 lb. piece of Beef Brisket
1 ½ T Salt
4 T Fish Sauce1 oz. (1-inch chunk) Yellow Rock Sugar

Ingredients (For the Bowls)
1 ½ -2 pounds dried or fresh banh pho noodles (“rice sticks”)
½ lb. raw Eye of Round or Sirloin Steak, thinly sliced across the grain (freeze 15 minutes for easier slicing)
1 medium Yellow Onion, sliced thin & soak for 30 min in a bowl of cold water
3 or 4 Scallions, green part only, diced diagonally
Bean Sprouts
Lime wedges
Basil

METHOD

Prepare the Pho broth

1. Char onion and ginger. Use an open flame on grill or gas stove. Place onions and ginger on cooking grate and let skin burn. After about 10 minutes, they will soften and become sweetly fragrant. Use tongs to occasionally rotate them. Enough to slightly cook them.
2. Sauté Spices. In a medium pan over medium heat sauté the star anise, cloves, fennel, cinnamon stick and cardamom until the aroma is strong. Remove the spices from the pan and set them aside.
3. Let cool.Under warm water, remove charred onion skin; trim and discard blackened parts of root or stem ends. If ginger skin is puckered and blistered, smash ginger with flat side of knife to loosen flesh from skin. Otherwise, use sharp paring knife to remove skin, running ginger under warm water to wash off blackened bits. Set aside.
4. Parboil bones. Place bones in stockpot (minimum 12-quart capacity) and cover with cold water.
5. Over high heat, bring to a boil. Boil vigorously 2 to 3 minutes to allow impurities to be released. Dump bones and water into sink and rinse bones with warm water. Quickly scrub stockpot to remove any residue. Return bones to pot.
6. Simmer broth.Add 6 quarts water to pot, bring to boil over high heat, then lower flame to gently simmer. Use ladle to skim any scum that rises to surface. Add remaining broth ingredients (you can use a large tea bag or cloth spice bag as well) and cook, uncovered, for 1 1/2 hours. Boneless meat should be slightly chewy but not tough. When it is cooked to your liking, remove it and place in bowl of cold water for 10 minutes; this prevents the meat from drying up and turning dark as it cools. Drain the meat; cool, then refrigerate. Allow broth to continue cooking and simmer another 1 1/2 -2 hours.
7. Strain the Pho broth through a fine strainer. Discard solids.
8. Use ladle to skim as much fat from top of the Pho broth. Taste and adjust flavor with additional salt, fish sauce and yellow rock sugar. The Pho broth should taste slightly too strong because the noodles and other ingredients are not salted. (If you’ve gone too far, add water to dilute.)

Assemble Pho bowls:

1. Thinly slice cooked meat.
2. Heat the Pho broth over medium heat while you assemble the side ingredients.
3. Fill 3- or 4-quart saucepan with water and bring to boil. For each bowl being used for Pho, use long-handle strainer to blanch a portion of noodles. As soon as noodles have collapsed and lost their stiffness (10-20 seconds), pull strainer from water, letting water drain back into saucepan. Empty noodles into bowls.
4. If you’re using dried noodles, cover with hot tap water and soak 15-20 minutes, until softened and opaque white. Drain in colander. For fresh rice noodles, just untangle and briefly rinse in a colander with cold water.

Enjoy!