Wednesday, October 14, 2009

pho


Yeehaw. It's that time again, when Alana makes a mess making something that she never dared to do before!

Pho! Or more accurately, Pho?

There's not much pho to be had around here, but every time we go to Denver, there's a whole lot of talk of the famous Vietnamese noodle soup. That said, I only went to a pho restaurant once, and unfortunately I was six weeks pregnant and had watermelon juice for lunch.
That's not to say that I wasn't interested. A deeply flavorful broth, rice noodles, meat, and a pile of fresh green herbs- only early pregnancy could keep me from that bowl of heaven.
And now, in the true spirit of the DIY revolution, I have made pho right here in my little kitchen.

And I had a pretty good time of it all in all. The best part? Well, as I've said before, I've been working on my chicken cutting skills so that I continue to attempt to call myself a real cook. And I'm getting pretty good at it. But for this? Take your cleaver and hack away. Kind of brutish, but Jaden asked that we expose as much bone as possible for a flavorful broth. No problem.

The October 2009 Daring Cooks’ challenge was brought to us by Jaden of the blog Steamy Kitchen. The recipes are from her new cookbook, The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook.

I'd say you should go for this one too. And your kitchen will smell holy if you worship in the house of food as I do. Charred onion and ginger, toasting spices; unbelievable. It all smells almost as good as it tastes. Go right over to Jaden's site for the recipe. I followed it pretty closely, except I must admit that I added a touch of salt. And of course, NO CILANTRO. I know that this is leaving out a fundamental ingredient, but NO! Stay back with your foul herb! I put lots if basil in instead, and that was lovely. But if you choose to go for the cilantro, I understand.

And go check out all those who dared to make pho!



9 comments:

  1. Oooh, your charred onions are GORGEOUS! I love the way you captured the charred layers. And I love to know that there's more people out there who detest cilantro - disgusting little weed, isn't it? :D

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  2. I love your photos--most especially the spices being toasted...yummy. MMmm :)

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  3. Haha, I loved hacking the chicken to bits with the cleaver! Your onions look really good, I wasn't able to get mine quite that charred.

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  4. What pretty pictures and your Pho looks stunning! :-)

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  5. That looks great! Beautiful blog btw! I'm new to it :) Cheers!

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  6. Gorgeous job! All of your photos are wonderful =D. I'm glad you liked it!

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  7. Oh, I love pho! There's a 24-hour place right down the street from me ... I think I will go NOW.

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  8. Alana..your Pho is a bowl of beauty, but my god...why am I drooling over those perfectly charred onions? Maybe because everything you make is mouth watering! Beautifully done all around! xoxoxo

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  9. Oh dear. Posting comments is tricky business. I just wanted to say that this looked so yummy, I made it for Peter's 50th birthday. Well, sort of. You know I'm not the best recipe follower. But the key ingredients were there and it was warm and spicey and delicious and surprisingly impressive for a noodle soup. Thanks for the inspiration.

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