Pho (Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup)
Ingredients:
1 large chuck roast (2-3 lbs)
6-8 cups Swanson beef broth (Trust me, the broth matters. If you are awesome and make your own beef stock, use that! But I am not that awesome)
1-2 cups water
1/4-1/3 cup fish sauce
4-6 peeled whole garlic cloves
3-4 inch long chunk of ginger, peeled and sliced into disks
2 cinnamon sticks
small handful star anise
1-2 tsp granulated sugar
rice noodles (thinner is better, thick get sticky, like pad thai)
Optional Toppings: limes, ENGLISH cucumber (firmer and crunchier with fewer seeds), shredded carrots, Thai basil, mint, cilantro, fresh jalapeno, yellow onion, scallions, bean sprouts, red chili paste (Sriracha)
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 250 degrees. Generously season the roast with salt and lots of pepper. Sear roast on all sides in a few teaspoons of oil on high heat in a frying pan.
Place roast in a baking dish (casserole, Corningware, etc) cover with lid or foil, cook 7 hours. Remove from oven, turn oven off, let roast rest in juices for 1 hour. After resting, save juices from roast, shred the roast and set shredded meat aside.
For Broth:
Combine broth, water, fish sauce, garlic, ginger, cinnamon sticks, anise, sugar, and reserved juices from the roast in large pot. Bring all to a boil. then lower to active simmer (you want the broth to be moving, not so low that there's no action! :) for 30-60 minutes. The longer you can let it simmer, the better your broth will taste! When done, strain solids out and throw them away. Serve as soon and as hot as possible!
At some point while broth is simmering, soak rice noodles in very hot water for 10 minutes. Drain and save for later (they are not quite ready yet) This is also a good time to prepare toppings. Suggestions: Cut limes in half (one half is usually perfect for each bowl. Limes are essential!) Slice cucumber in half lengthwise and then into inch-ish long slices. Cut yellow onion in half, then slice as paper thin as you can get them. Dice (VERY small) or slice fresh jalapeno into disks. Roughly chop herbs. (We used to use mint, then we discovered Thai basil and Stephen is hooked. We don't use cilantro but many people do) We love the pre-cut thin carrot sticks that some grocery stores carry with their salad makings; if you can't find those, grate a few carrots on the large holes of a cheese grater. Chop a few scallions a few minutes before serving, not too far in advance or they develop a soapy flavor.
When ready to serve, bring a small pot of water to a boil. Eyeball a serving of noodles, place in wire strainer, and immerse in boiling water for 10-20 seconds. This softens the noodles a bit more and removes extra starch. Place noodles in bowl, top with chosen toppings, shredded beef, and spoon broth over the top. Squeeze about half a lime over soup and Enjoy! (I gave amounts for a smaller batch, that will yield a few days of leftovers, and bigger batch for serving to company... or multiple teenage boys...)