Homemade Vietnamese Pho Broth

I regret that I didn't put more broth into my bowl above just for the photo. Perhaps the reason why I didn't was because the recipe I tried produced such small quantity for so much work involved and I didn't want to use all the broth in one eating. :p I started with six quarts of water and only got three quarts when I was done. The broth tasted good, but I was disappointed that it took so much work for such small results. I probably will not make pho broth from scratch again. I know I mentioned in my earlier posts the obvious reasons, but it's been at least ten years since I last made pho broth from scratch and wanted to see if I could improve. Just not worth the time or money. This recipe I tried was good, but it had too much salt to it (including the fish sauce). When I ate the pho, I didn't need to add any extra condiments except for the hot sauce. No fish sauce or hoisin. Nada. I wasn't used to that. It really didn't need it. I suppose that's a good thing, right? I guess not if someone doesn't like their pho to be on the salty side. Also, I skimmed the fat twice and it was still pretty greasy. I got tired of skimming it, so I quit at the second time. My broth came out darker than what I'm used to seeeing. I left the bag of spices in the whole time. I read from another recipe to take it out after 30 minutes. This recipe I tried did have a more intense flavor because the dried spices was simmered for at least four hours. Would I recommend this recipe? Yes. It was good. A lot better than some home made pho I have had before. I just wouldn't make this again because it was just too much work and ingredients. You can find the recipe from Andrea Nguyen. I also referenced Wandering Chopsticks and here.

Yellow rock sugar, star anise, whole cloves and cinnamon stick:


Charbroiling the onions and ginger in the oven under broil since I don't have open flame. Flavors are still there doing it this way:


Putting all the ingredients together in the pot. I used 2.5 lbs oxtails and the rest bones with marrow and tendon. I also put my spices in a pouch. You can use cheesecloth as well or use none at all. It's just easier to get them out later especially if you want the spices out earlier:


Make sure you submerge everything under water:


I skimmed the foam and and other impurities with this handy dandy tool that I found at the local Asian store. It works very good since the mesh is very fine:


After boiling for four hours and letting it cool, I put the pot in the fridge overnight and took out the fat that submerged to the top. I did this twice and it was still greasy. Seeing all this fat scared my husband, so he didn't even bother eating the pho I made for us. I told him this is how it's made and he doesn't believe me. He thinks pho broth just magically comes out clear.

Beef with Snow Peas

I don't know why, but I always thought snow peas were called sugar peas. At least that's what I grew up thinking. Along with cherry tomatoes, we used to grow and sell snow peas when I was younger. My parents would have about an acre or two of these. It was hard work! As a kid, my job was to just help plant the seeds, go with my mom to water the plants at night (because it would get so hot during the day in CA), and basically just sit and watch the "house" that my dad built for our farm. It was usually just my younger sister and I that went (out of all the kids in the family). Sometimes I was responsible for grilling the meats over the wood burning fire pit. That to me was some of the best food ever. As much as I disliked going to the farm back in the days, I also miss them now. It was a big part of my childhood and reminds me of how hard my parents worked. It reminds me a lot of my dad who's no longer with us. :( Our Hmong parents are truly great farmers. They know how to grow anything. When we stopped farming, I realized how much poorer we became because the extra income wasn't there to support us.

Anyway, there is really nothing special about the ingredients in this recipe, but I liked how it was cooked. I liked that it was cooked in an iron skillet and the meat was charred (like how I usually like meat). I also added garlic to mine. I love garlic. I just bought some cheap beef from Wal-Mart because I was already there and didn't feel like stopping at another store. Never buy fresh meat from Wal-Mart. They have some of the worst meat IMO. The dish was saltier than what I would've liked probably because I didn't have enough meat (only one pound instead of 1.5). Overall, I would give this recipe a 3/5 stars. Again nothing special, but I liked how it was cooked and how vibrant the sauce made the dish look once it's finished.

The recipe is from The Pioneer Woman. She has great photos and step by step directions, so I never even bother to repeat hers. I'll post the recipe anyway in case it should ever disappear somehow.

Ingredients
1 1/2 pound Flank Steak, Trimmed Of Fat And Sliced Very Thin Against The Grain
1/2 cups Low Sodium Soy Sauce
3 Tablespoons Sherry Or Cooking Sherry
2 Tablespoons Brown Sugar
2 Tablespoons Cornstarch
1 Tablespoon Minced Fresh Ginger
8 ounces, weight Fresh Snow Peas, Ends Trimmed
5 whole Scallions, Cut Into Half-inch Pieces On The Diagonal
Salt As Needed (use Sparingly)
3 Tablespoons Peanut Or Olive Oil
Crushed Red Pepper, For Sprinkling

Preparation InstructionsIn a bowl, mix together soy sauce, sherry, brown sugar, cornstarch, and ginger. Add sliced meat to bowl and toss with hands. Set aside.

Heat oil in a heavy skillet (iron is best) or wok over high heat. Add snow peas and stir for 45 seconds. Remove to a separate plate. Set aside.

Allow pan to get very hot again. With tongs, add half the meat mixture, leaving most of the marinade still in the bowl. Add half the scallions. Spread out meat as you add it to pan, but do not stir for a good minute. (You want the meat to get as brown as possible in as short amount a time as possible.) Turn meat to the other side and cook for another 30 seconds. Remove to a clean plate.

Repeat with other half of meat, allowing pan to get very hot again first. After turning it, add the first plateful of meat, the rest of the marinade, and the snow peas. Stir over high heat for 30 seconds, then turn off heat. Check seasonings and add salt only if it needs it. Mixture will thicken as it sits.

Serve immediately over rice. Sprinkle crushed red pepper over the top to give it some spice.

Spicy Shredded Beef

This is one of my favorite Hmong dishes. It's Hmong because I haven't eaten it anywhere else besides our Hmong household lol. I've been eating/making this ever since I was a young girl. We had some relatives that stayed with us for a few days and one of them made this dish for us. It was the first time we've ever had this dish (my family and I) and we thought it was soooo good! It still is. I've been making it since then. The funny thing is that back in the old days even though it was available at the time such as the food processor, can opener, mop and broom, etc., my family never bought any of those "modern" appliances. We did everything the old-fashion-back-in-Laos days. Yep, we chopped meat manually, opened the cans with knives and mopped the floors with towels using our feet. Even though the convenience was out there, I still chopped this meat manually for several years until just a few years ago, I finally decided to go buy a mini-food processor. That was why I didn't like making this dish as much because it took so much time chopping the meat, but I knew it was all worth it. Ingredients: 1 lb of beef (I normally just buy the beef for beef stew that comes in chunks at the store) 2 cloves of garlic 1/2 cup cilantro, chopped 1/2 cup green onions, chopped 1 1/2 tbsp of fish sauce, 1 tbsp of lime juice (has to be fresh, never use that other kind!) 1 tbsp of dried red chilli pepper, crushed Method: Spread the meat evenly on a foil-lined baking sheet. Broil at 500 degrees until brown on each side, about 20 minutes the first side and 5-10 minutes the other side. When you turn over to the other side, be sure to drain the liquid off the baking sheet. You do not want the meat to get moist. It needs to be dry, almost like beef jerky. This is how the meat should look like after it's cooked on both sides. I let my meat cool off either still on the rack or in a dish. I don't like to run things that are hot in my food processor for fear of burning the thing. It's happened before at another household. Once meat has been cooled off, chop (shred) the meat in a food processor until medium-finely chopped; otherwise, you can manually chop the meat with a knife. Using a mortar and pestle, pound two cloves of garlic until bruised. Next, throw in the meat, cilantro and green onions. Mix with a spoon. Add the fish sauce, lime juice and pepper. Mix well with a spoon. This is where you might want to go sparingly because you might like yours less salty, sour or hot. This is just how I made mine and I like things spicy and hot! Using the pestle and spoon, mix and pound all the ingredients together. I prefer using the mortar and pestle because it allows one to infuse all the flavors together. I don't get the same effect with any other method. Keep pounding it a couple of times until the meat and herbs are somewhat bruised: This dish is meant to be served at room temperature or even cold. I just like eating it with white rice and mixing the two. Tastes great with sticky rice too.

Korean Short Ribs (kabi)

This uses the same marinade as the recipe for bulgogi. I was trying to be a little more adventurous by trying a different marinade recipe. Should've just stuck to what I know is good. I tried a different recipe today and the meat turned out too salty. It was still yummy, but too salty. I would've liked it to be sweeter. Part of the reason is probably because I also tried out a new soy sauce instead of my usual lower sodium soy sauce and the recipe called for less sugar than one I used earlier. Also, I bought the kimchi from a non-Korean grocery store, and it did not taste as good as the one I previously bought. The kimchi was also too salty. All in all, the meat and kimchi were too salty, so they did not complement each other as they were supposed too. I would make this again, except I would just use the recipe I made in my earlier post for bulgogi.

Here is a good post on how the flaken-ribs should look like when you look for it at the store, but I do not recommend the recipe. It turned out too salty for my taste. It didn't even have ginger or regular onions so I added them on my own. I wanted to add more sugar too, but wanted to "trust" the original recipe. I think it's time I trust my own cooking instincts. I'm getting better at cooking now, so why not?? :P If I did, I wouldn't have thrown up when trying this other recipe I found a while back when it called for one or two tablespoons of shrimp paste. Gross. I mean, the only time I use shrimp paste is in my papaya salad and I only use a little, itty bit of it. Again, I should've known and trusted myself! I guess I thought the thought of using that much shrimp paste would've been okay since that is how curry paste is made, but this one wasn't a curry dish. The picture looked so good too. Oh well, this blog is a food adventure-blog after all. No (more) regrets! :P

Ingredients:
4 lbs flaken-style beef short ribs (I found mine at Dragon Star oriental store)

Marinade:
1/2 cup soy sauce
1 Korean pear or Asian pear, grated with juices
2 tablespoons finely chopped garlic
1/2 small white onion, grated or sliced
1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
2 tablespoons light brown sugar
1 tablespoon honey
2 tablespoons sesame seeds, toasted
2 tablespoons toasted sesame oil
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
2 green onions, thinly sliced
1 (20-ounce) bottle lemon-lime soda, optional (recommended: Sprite or 7-Up)

Method:
1. Mix all marinade ingredients together in a large bowl. Add meat to the bowl and mix well. Transfer the marinated meat to a Ziploc bag and marinate overnight. Make sure to let out all the air from the bag.
2. Grill meat on grill for about 4 minutes, or if using oven, set to BROIL at 500 degrees and broil each side for about 4 minutes or until slightly charred. It should not take very long to cook these since they are cut thin.
3. Serve with rice and kimchi. This would also go well with sides of veggies. Yum!

Meatloaf

I made this a while back, but just never posted it. Maybe it's because I'm not the biggest fan of meatloaf. I decided to just make it for my husband since he likes it. This recipe was good, but it didn't change my mind about loving meatloaf. I like meatballs, but for some reason I don't like meatloaf. They're similar, but not exactly the same. I guess I would give this recipe of 3. Not great, but not bad either. The sauce or relish for the meatloaf is different though. Much different than your regular ketchup. I actually liked that part of the recipe. The potatoes I've made before (from scratch of course) and the beans were just drizzled with olive oil, seasoned with S&P, then baked in the oven at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes until tender but still crisp.

Recipe from Food Network.

Steak Tacos

I love the steak tacos from Chipotle. I usually just order the crispy tacos with steak, three different kinds of salsa, and lettuce. Nothing else. They used to serve four, but now only serve three for the same price. I still eat it once in a while. I wasn't attempting to make the same taco from Chipotle, but I had some beef sirloin in hand, so I made some tacos and fresh salsa for the other night. I love salsa! It's even better when it's super hot and spicy. Yum.

Steak Tacos
Recipe courtesy of Ellie Krieger of Food Network

Thai Grilled Beef Salad

This was on my list of healthier dishes last week. It tasted pretty good. Even though it was beef, it tasted quite lean and still very tender. I have been making pretty good steak recently! I ate my salad with rice, but I wish I had some rice vermicilli noodles to mix with it. It would've filled me up more.

Recipe courtesy of Ellie Krieger of Food Network

1 pound top-round London broil or flank steak, about 1 to 1 1/2-inches thick
3 tablespoons lime juice, divided
3 tablespoons low-sodium soy sauce
3 tablespoons canola oil
2 tablespoon brown sugar
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 1/2 teaspoons minced ginger
1 1/4 teaspoons red curry paste or chili-garlic sauce
1/2 head red-leaf lettuce, torn (about 6 cups)
3 shallots, thinly sliced (about 1/2 cup), divided, for garnish
1/2 cup cilantro leaves, rinsed and dried
1 cup basil leaves, sliced into ribbons
Directions
Rinse and pat the meat dry. Place in a sealable plastic bag or small glass dish. In a medium bowl combine 1 tablespoon of the lime juice, soy sauce, canola oil, brown sugar, garlic, ginger and red curry paste. Pour half the mixture into the bag with the meat. Add the remaining 2 tablespoons lime juice to the bag. Seal tightly, and marinate meat in refrigerator at least 4 hours or overnight, turning occasionally. Reserve the rest of the mixture refrigerated, to dress the salad.

Spray grill or grill pan with cooking spray and preheat. Grill steak until medium-rare, about 5 minutes per side, depending on desired doneness. Let rest until room temperature then slice thinly against the grain.

Combine lettuce, sliced shallot, cilantro, basil and beef in a salad bowl, reserving a few shallots for garnish. Add the reserved dressing and toss to coat. Divide salad among 4 plates and garnish with reserved sliced shallots.

Bibimbap and Bulgogi

Origally posted 06/21/09 from my other blog:

So last week I found a good recipe for bulgogi and bibimbap, both are Korean dishes. We had the opportunity to try Korean food a couple of years ago when this small restaurant called Korean House was still open in the Cedar/Riverside neighborhood in Minneapolis. It since closed down and I haven't been able to find another Korean restaurant that made the two dishes good. I tried this recipe last week and I must say it turned out really good! I was so impressed and happy that I decided to take pictures of it this time. Last week I made the bulgogi with sirloin steak instead and this week I tried it with rib-eye meat. I couldn't really taste the difference. Maybe the rib-eye is just slightly more tender because it's fattier, but since rib- eye is more expensive I think I will just go with sirloin again next time. Also last time I went by what the recipe said. It said to add ground red pepper and the Sprite or 7-up. Last time the red pepper made the dish too hot and all the bulgogi I've tried was not hot, more sweet, so this time I omitted the red pepper completely and it tasted more authentic to me. This time I forgot to add the Sprite or 7-up and I thought that would ruin the taste, but it didn't. It tasted just fine. Actually, I think the Sprite diluted the marinade a little bit. I also used light soy sauce instead both times, so I'm not even going to try the regular soy sauce since it might make it too salty. I also bought a store version of the bulgogi sauce. I did marinade some meat in it, but haven't bothered cooking it to see how it tasted like. When I opened the bottle, it just stank and didn't come close to the home made version. Also, I tried making some short grain rice to make this more authentic and it did not turn out lol. Too wet and sticky. That was my first attempt so I'll need to do a little more research and experiment.

For the veggies in the bibimbap dish, I chose carrots, daikon, spinach, zucchini and bean sprouts.



Here's a picture of all the stuff I made, including the bulgogi meat and the gochujang sauce. I need coordinated plates lol. Oh, and the table in the background I've had for over 10 years now since college. :D



Ok, here's the recipe from Food Network.

Ingredients
Steamed white rice
Bulgogi, recipe follows
1 carrot, julienned
Cooked bean sprouts, sauteed in a little sesame oil or peanut oil and seasoned with salt
Cooked spinach, sauteed in a little sesame or peanut oil and seasoned with salt
4 shiitake mushrooms, thinly sliced and sauteed in peanut oil and seasoned with salt
1 egg, cooked over easy
1 tablespoon sesame seeds
1 tablespoon dark sesame oil
Soy sauce, to taste
Gochuchang Paste, recipe follows

Directions


*Cook's Note: This can be done in a regular bowl or a hot stone bowl. If it's in a hot stone bowl, the rice becomes crunchy because it's still cooking.



Put cooked rice in large slightly shallow bowl. Place bulgogi (with juices from cooked meat) and veggies on top of rice but place separately so you can see each ingredient beautifully placed on rice. Put egg on top. Sprinkle with sesame seeds and drizzle with sesame oil and soy sauce.



When ready to eat, mix all ingredients together with some gochuchang paste, to taste. The bibimpap should be moist and not dry. Add more sesame oil and gochuchang paste, to taste.


Bulgogi:

1 pound rib-eye



Marinade:

1/2 cup soy sauce

1 Korean pear or Asian pear, grated with juices

2 tablespoons finely chopped garlic

1/2 small white onion, grated or sliced

1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger

2 tablespoons light brown sugar

1 tablespoon honey

2 tablespoons sesame seeds, toasted

2 tablespoons toasted sesame oil

1 tablespoon ground red pepper

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

2 green onions, thinly sliced

1 (20-ounce) bottle lemon-lime soda, optional (recommended: Sprite or 7-Up)


Place rib-eye in freezer for about 30 minutes so that it is easier to thinly slice. When partially frozen, remove from freezer and thinly slice. Set aside.



Whisk together all the marinade ingredients in a large baking dish. Add the thinly sliced beef and turn to coat. Cover and refrigerate for at least 1 hour or overnight; it is best if marinated overnight.



Heat grill to high. Remove beef from marinade and grill for 1 to 2 minutes per side. Remove from heat and set aside until ready to compile Bibimbap


Gochuchang Paste (seasoned red pepper paste):

4 tablespoons gochuchang (available at Korean grocers)

1 tablespoon sugar

1 tablespoon sesame seeds

2 teaspoons sesame oil


Combine all ingredients in a small bowl. Mix well.