BEST-EVER PHO RECIPE | Helen’s Recipes

5 years from the day I made my first PHO video on Youtube (https://youtu.be/5bIjDYEs6Qc), how would I improve the recipe, especially after publishing a whole book dedicated to this iconic Vietnamese dish? I hope you enjoy some new more tricks and secrets that I share in this video!

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►Some of your favorites | Các video được yêu thích nhất:
Best ever Pho Recipe | Phở: https://youtu.be/EpRBxau3ou0
Original Bun Bo | Bún Bò Huế: https://youtu.be/4222YFNqDP8
Vietnamese Baguette | Bí Kiếp Bánh Mì Gia Truyền: https://youtu.be/Dz9r3vNRxPA
Cooking with Grandma | Vào Bếp cùng Ngoại: https://youtu.be/UkZL4Dkjqpg
All Vietnamese desserts | Các món tráng miệng https://bit.ly/3rAMEvn
Everyday family meals | Bữa cơm gia đình https://bit.ly/3jzuiZ0

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It’s suddenly very windy and cold today, and all what I can think of right now is to have a bowl of piping hot phở. Here in Vietnam we eat pho for breakfast, for lunch, for dinner or any meal in between. Phở is the ultimate comfort food. Look at this. Oh my god.

It smells amazing. So here I ordered a version of tái nạm which is with rare beef and beef brisket. So before learning how to make pho at home, firstly you need to know how to eat and enjoy a bowl of phở, right? Here I have at the side some sawtooth coriander.

I know many of you in the US, the first thing you’re going to do with your pho is to take sriracha and hoisin and squeeze through the bowl and no no, that’s not the right way to do it.

Because first of all you want to taste the broth which is the essence of most phở bowl, and the restaurant owner has spent hours to create this, so you don’t want to let the sriracha and hoisin overpower your soup bowl. So first of all, smell it and have a sip. Oh my god.

The broth is so hearty, so sweet and flavorful. So the pickled garlic will add a slight hint of sour to your bowl and it’s also a really good medicine. You know phở is not just food, it’s medicine because it’s cooked from many kinds of herbs and spices, all very good for you.

They also have some extra chili here to put in, if you like. And of course, you want to take a few leaves of the basil and the sawtooth herbs. Just a few sprigs of those, a little bit of lime, some blanched spring sprouts. Mmm, I can’t wait to dig in.

Mmm, oh my god. This is not the only pho noodle in Da Nang but I like it a lot because of the flavor of the food, of course, and I like the setup, very street-style. And this is also the place that I shoot for the photos in my Simply Pho Cookbook.

So free advertising for them. The beef is really tender. The red beef also cooks when you ladle the hot soup over, it’s so tender and flavorful. After the first 2 or 3 bites, if you think that it’s not salty enough, you can add more fish sauce to your taste.

You can squeeze in sriracha or hoisin if you like. But what I really like to do is, you know, to squeeze sriracha and hoisin on a separate bowl to dip the beef so the broth will still stay clear. Mmm, oh my god.

Coming up next, I will show you how to make this at home. About 5 years ago, I already made a video for pho and now as per some of your requests, I will make it again with some improvement on the recipes as well as the video quality.

One question that I get asked very frequently is, what is the most important thing to achieve in pho? And I will say immediately, that is the broth. For flavorful broth, I use a mix of bones like, you know, knuckles, marrow, ribs, and oxtails. The more the merrier.

Choose mature bones with less fat because they can give you a deeper and sweeter flavor. You need to soak the bones in salted water and rinse a few times to cut down the blood in the bones first.

You also need to soak the beef shank and the brisket in water overnight or for a couple of hours at least. They will release the blood, as you can see, in the color change of the water. Change the water a few times if possible.

If you look at my bowl of pho that I made 5 years ago and pay attention to detail, you will see some black bits in the beef slice and that is the area of blood when it’s cooked.

So this time, by improvement, you want to soak the bones and the beef in water for a few hours, so all the blood will come out and you will get a really nice slice of beef later.

To make the broth, you will place the bones in a stock pot filled with enough water to cover them. And bring to a boil for about 5 to 10 minutes until all the impurities rise to the top.

And then drain the pot and rinse the bones well under running water to wash away all the impurities. Some will say, Helen, why you wasted the broth? Don’t worry, because during the first 5 or 10 minutes of boiling, the bones will release all the impurities and residues.

By parboiling, it will help to cut down on skimming and the bones’ true essence only comes out after a few hours of cooking. So don’t worry, okay? Next, you will place the bones to a large stock pot with the beef brisket and the water.

If you use the same pot, make sure that you clean it well before putting the bones back. It’s very, very crucial for a clear broth. While bringing to a boil, add a whole peeled onion to enhance the sweetness and it also helps to keep the broth clear.

Also add rock sugar and salt for flavor. Rock sugar has a milder taste than regular sugar. You can substitute rock sugar with, you know, sugarcane or castor sugar is also okay. Then bring it to a boil and reduce the heat to medium-low and then simmer uncovered. Occasionally skim off the scum

And depending on the cut of the beef, it might take about 1-2 hours to cook. If the broth reduces, you can add hot water to compensate, making sure that you always have the same amount of water as you started.

Cooking the broth over high heat will make it cloudy and has a really sour aftertaste. So make sure that you don’t cover when you cook the broth, and it will keep the broth clear. The second important thing in a bowl of pho that we value is of course the aroma.

To create the phở aroma, you’re gonna need to heat two onion halves and a few ginger slices directly over an open flame on the stove until it’s slightly charred on all sides. Peel the grilled onion and try to keep the stem intact

And not let the onion layers fall apart, and scrape off all the black bits. You also need some star anises, cinnamon sticks, black cardamom pods and a few cloves. You’re gonna toast all these ingredients in a pan over medium-low heat until fragrant for about 2 minutes.

Then place all of these spices in a spice ball or a large tea filter bag or a cheese cloth if you have. I bought this really cute spice ball at the Vietnamese market. Very convenient to cook phở. You’re gonna put this into the stock pot just 1 hour before serving,

So the aroma will stay fresh and tempting until you serve. So one secret ingredient in making phở in Northern Vietnam is sea worm or sá sùng. We talk a lot about Northern Vietnamese phở because phở originally comes from the North. Sá sùng is a very expensive and hard-to-find ingredient.

You probably can’t find it overseas. Even in Vietnam, it’s only available in certain parts, especially in the North. For 1kg of dried sa sùng, it will cost somewhere about 4 million dongs or almost 200 bucks. These sea worms live along the southern seashore in Northern Vietnam

And you only need just a few of them for 1 big pot of phở. It’s considered the natural MSG for the rich people because it’s quite pricey. So I bought these dried at the market. You need to firstly dry fry them or toast in a pan until fragrant.

They will release a lot of sand as you can see here. Then you cut the tube open, and clean the sand and dirt along the inner sides and outside of the body. If sá sùng is not available, you can use other dried seafood like you know, shrimps, dried scallops, dried squid, etc.

Remember to grill them first to remove the fishy smell before adding to the broth for more fragrance and natural sweetness. So now you know the secret. After 1-1.5 hours of cooking, when you pierce the meat with a chopstick and see no pink water coming out, it’s cooked.

You remove the beef brisket and soak in a large bowl of ice-cold water for about 5 minutes to prevent it from darkening Then drain and thinly slice into bite-sized pieces. Then set aside. You also want to remove the onion in the stock pot,

Because if they break, they will make the broth less clear. Also continue to simmer the broth for at least a few more hours on very low heat if you have time. The broth should simmer for at least 2 hours from the beginning of the making of the recipe

Traditional phở is cooked overnight, so it could take up to 8 hours. Finally, just season the broth to your taste, add more salt, some more sugar and stock powder. If you use dry noodles, just soak in water for about 15 minutes

And then place them in a noodle strainer together with some bean sprouts Then submerge into a pot of boiling water for a couple of minutes. And then you lift it up, let the water drip into a bowl, swirl the bowl to warm it up and pour the water back.

To assemble the phở bowl, you’re gonna need to fill the serving bowls 1 third full with noodles and then top with the beef slices. You can use the cooked beef or some raw beef of your choice. Then ladle the hot broth over noodles to fill the bowl.

The broth will cook the raw beef in just a few seconds. Some onion slices, chopped scallions. One thing very important but it can tell whether your phở is authentic or not is a few scallion stems. There you have it, a very delicious bowl of phở, ready to serve.

You’re gonna need a platter of fresh herbs, some Asian basil and sawtooth herbs, some blanched bean sprouts, a few lime wedges. If you want to learn how the Vietnamese cut lime into wedges, just look at this.

You want to cut it in half, slightly off the core, and then you continue to cut into pieces. Just avoid the core so you have a really juicy wedge of lime, very easy to squeeze and also no seeds. You can also use some hoisin sauce and sriracha at the side for dipping.

So I’ve just finished my bowl of pho. It feels so good, so satisfying and recharged. So I hope you enjoyed today’s video and please click like and subscribe to my channel for more amazing recipes like this. Don’t forget to share with me your photo on Instagram with hashtag #helenrecipes.

This recipe together with so many other amazing pho and noodle recipes will be found in my cookbook called Simply Pho. You can click on the card to order one if you haven’t already and I will see you then in the next video. Thank you for watching. Bye bye.