Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Somethings are just too pho-king good...

Today, I made Pho.  (pronounced Fuh.)  We used to eat Pho a lot in Buffalo, at 99 Fast Food mostly.  Not a great part of town, but the Pho there...Delicious stuff.  There's a little place in Utica we found, though we've only been there once, and another, called PhoShizzle, opened, then closed rather quickly.  I've been wanting some.  Badly.  Enough to make me find that link I booked marked so long ago, and read through it several times, and even enough to go to the store and find all the ingredients, including bones.

I'm an American girl, I admit it.  Buying bones made me a little weirded out.  Not that I could tell you why- maybe because they were, you know...bones, and not meat.  Of course, when I went shopping for them, I couldn't find them, and in the end, John found them and bought them.  But the point is...buying bones is just not something I ever did before, and it was just really odd.  For like 5 minutes.  And then I made Pho and I will be buying bones again.  And trust me, it was not as bad as having to cut the feet off my own semi frozen fresh turkey, complete with more than a handful of feathers and gizzards still intact. That's a story for another day I suppose.

Cooking all day baby
It was a sort of nice way to combat the cold and snow that hit today.  our area was hardly hit at all, thankfully, but it was cold!  I figured today of all days would be a good day to make something so warm and delicious.

The recipe was easy.  I followed it pretty precisely, only lacking a cardamon pod.  I parboiled the bones, and charred the ginger and onions, and a bag of spices (which I really liked using.)  Within minutes of the bones, meat, and spices boiling, my entire house smelled like a Pho restaurant.  It goes without saying that I was very excited, and very hungry all day.

In the end, the Pho broth was REALY good.  A little greasy, but according to that blog, I can reduce the amount of marrow I use, and it won't be as greasy.  My mistake was grabbing the wrong type of noodle, and canned bean sprouts.  Before you ask "What??!!", let me tell you...I couldn't find fresh bean sprouts, and forgot how soggy the canned ones were. And sadly, the only rice noodle product at the store was the uber thin "rice stick" (mifun) style and I really needed the thicker style. 
My bowl of pho!

However, in the end, it was really good.  Pho-king good.  And I still have a ton of broth left, happily sitting in my freezer, for another cold day to be combated with a bowl of steaming hot Pho.

2 comments:

  1. Until just now I had no idea what Pho was. Except that I saw you mention something about it on Facebook. Looks good! It would be interesting to try if I weren't married to the Pickiest Eater In The World...

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  2. Picky eater needs to try it! It's really good, very refreshing and not too beefy tasting.

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