Vietnamese
Pho Bo (Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup)
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Pho Bo (Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup) is Vietnamese home cooking, eaten at breakfast, lunch, and dinner. On the plate it is the dish at the centre. Below is what usually sits beside it, what it does and does not contain, and what else to cook once you have made it.
Ingredients
The quantities follow this count.
How to cook it
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Put the beef bones in a large stockpot, cover with cold water and boil hard for 5 minutes, then drain and rinse both the bones and the pot so the broth stays clear.
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Char the halved onions and the ginger over a gas flame or under the broiler until blackened in spots, about 10 minutes, then rinse off the loose char.
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Toast the star anise, cinnamon stick, cloves and coriander seeds in a dry pan until fragrant, about 2 minutes, and tie them in a spice bag or a square of cheesecloth.
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Return the bones to the pot with the beef shank and the water, bring to a boil, then drop to the barest simmer and skim the foam for the first 20 minutes.
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Add the charred onion and ginger, the fish sauce, sugar and salt, and simmer uncovered for 3 hours, adding the spice bag only for the last 45 minutes so it does not turn bitter.
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Lift out the shank once it is tender, after about 1.5 hours, cool it in a bowl of cold water so it does not darken, and slice it thinly.
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Strain the broth, skim off most of the fat and taste for salt; it should be a little saltier than you would drink on its own, because the noodles dilute it.
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Soak and blanch the rice noodles as the packet directs and divide them among large bowls with the sliced shank and the raw thin beef on top.
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Ladle the boiling broth over so it cooks the raw beef, scatter with scallions and cilantro, and pass Thai basil, bean sprouts, lime and chilies at the table. A pot this size is a Sunday cook; on weekdays most families buy their pho.
Serve it with
A Vietnamese dinner is a plate rather than a single dish. These are the courses that normally sit beside Pho Bo (Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup), read from the same composition Dinejot builds a real meal from.
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The cooked vegetable
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Something to sip
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What it is eaten with
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Something cool and fresh
Safe at your table
Dinejot tracks ten allergens and tags every one of them by hand, so the absences below are as deliberate as the presences. Pho Bo (Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup) carries fish. It is free of the remaining 9 allergens on that list.
| Allergen | In this dish | Cook this instead |
|---|---|---|
| Peanuts | No | |
| Tree nuts | No | |
| Dairy | No | |
| Gluten | No | |
| Shellfish | No | |
| Eggs | No | |
| Soy | No | |
| Fish | Yes | Banh Mi Op La (Baguette with Fried Eggs) |
| Sesame | No | |
| Coconut | No |
These tags are set by a person rather than inferred from an ingredient list, and they describe the recipe as written here. Read the labels on whatever you actually buy.
What it brings to the plate
Estimated, per serving
- Calories
- 510 kcal
- Protein
- 35 g
- Carbs
- 70 g
- Fat
- 9 g
- Fiber
- 3 g
- Sugar
- 5 g
- Sodium
- 1900 mg
- Saturated fat
- 4 g
Estimated values. Actual nutrition varies with ingredients, brands, and how you cook.
When to cook it
Pho Bo (Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup) takes about 240 minutes from a cold stove to the table, and the cooking itself is a proper project. It is eaten at breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Nothing in the calendar rules it out, so it is a year round dish.
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Cook this with your whole family
Dinejot plans breakfast, lunch and dinner as whole plates, built around the cooking you call home and filtered for the allergies at your table.
Meal suggestions support your goals. They are not medical advice. Please ask your doctor about your family's health needs.