Updated 07-25-12. There are three elements that make up a bowl of Vietnamese pho: the broth, the rice noodles and the toppings (meat, garnishes, etc.) If you are a pho lover, you may be a fan of the noodles or of the way the meat, herbs and spices play together in your mouth as you slurp your pho to the last drop. There’s no denying that the pho broth is the most important element of Vietnamese pho. Pho broth is the soul of the dish. It is what makes the dish Vietnamese pho.
Pho note: This article on Pho Broth is both a how to make pho broth and a philosophical look at the meaning of the broth in pho. If you are looking for the nuts and bolts of making pho, please go directly to these 2 articles: Top Pho Bo and Pho Ga Recipes You Must Try Yourself and Quick Beef Pho Recipe with Quoc Viet Foods’ Pho Soup Base.
Giving Meaning to the Soul of Pho
Can you imagine Vietnamese pho without its broth? It is probably impossible to do so. You may try to cook up all kinds of soups, pour it in the bowl and try to call it pho. You may resort to be creative with different meats and adding new herbs and garnishing to the mix, but it’s just not pho. The pho broth is what gives the soup its distinct character. There’s not necessarily only one way to make pho broth, but a good pho broth must follow certain rules and standards.
In fact, the key to a successful bowl of pho is the creation of a good pho broth. Pho lovers judge the bowl of pho served to them in a restaurant by sipping the broth first without putting in any seasoning or garnishing. If there’s any doubt about the quality of a bowl of pho, just take a sip of the broth to find out. If the pho broth is good, we feel immediately at home; the familiar, the warm, the good, the satisfying. But if the broth is not up to expectation, the pho eating experience becomes labored, beside the fact that one is wasting the time and money with this darn bowl of pho.
You’d be surprised, but it’s far too easy to make a bad bowl of pho. The only way to do it is to make the pho broth unpalatable. You can be forgiven for serving undercooked or overcooked banh pho (the pho noodle). You can be forgiven for not having all the right meat types or garnishing. But mess up the pho broth and your pho is ruined. Conversely, serving a great pho broth will make up for your other shortcomings many times over. There is no perfect technique for making it, but what technique is there must be done carefully to create the perfect broth, with the right taste.
How to Make Pho Broth
There is no single perfect technique for creating good pho broth. The Vietnamese always say that the best pho you will ever taste is the one cooked by your own mother (plus maybe one or two favorite restaurants), and she will have her own ideas of how good pho broth is made. These ideas, in turn, are ones that have been handed down to her by her own mother. Thus, no two bowls of pho made in two separate kitchens will ever taste the same.
But most pho recipes you will find have many common elements, from the ingredients that go into the broth to the length of time required in making the broth. Vietnamese culinary experts Andrea Nguyen‘s and Mai Pham‘s beef pho recipes call for the following ingredients:
- Yellow onions
- Ginger
- Marrow-rich beef bones and beef knuckle bones
- Additional beef chunks
- Star anise
- Cloves
- Salt
- Fish sauce
- Yellow rock sugar
Here’s a generic process. Many recipes call for preparation using two stockpots of boiling water. The beef bones and chunks are parboiled in one pot in high heat for up to five minutes. This is to remove all the fat and impurities in the beef. Andrea Nguyen recommends rinsing the bones in warm water before being transferred into the second stockpot, while Mai Pham says that it is fine to just transfer the bones and the chunks without rinsing.
In any case, the second stockpot is kept at a simmer for an hour and a half, with any scum rising to the top ladled out regularly. The spices are then added, either as they are or wrapped in cheesecloth. Before they are put into the broth, the onions and the ginger need to be charred in open flame. Mai Pham recommends toasting the star anise and the cloves lightly in a dry pan before they are put into the pot. Again techniques vary, but one can see the care and variations involved to make a good pho broth.
After the hour and a half has passed, the boneless beef chunks are removed. The remaining broth is allowed to simmer for another hour and a half or so. The pho broth is then strained and then seasoned with fish sauce, salt and rock sugar. At this point, the pho broth should look clear and free from impurities. It is perfectly acceptable for it to taste strong and even salty at this point as well because the taste will be toned down once the broth is poured over the unseasoned rice noodles and meat.
The recipe described above is the most generally accepted way of cooking pho broth. But since no two bowls of pho made from two separate kitchens ever taste the same, techniques on how to make the broth vary from kitchen to kitchen. Some cooks, for instance, do not put fish sauce in the broth but instead leave it up to the eater to season it as he or she pleases. Some cooks also skip on adding beef chunks into the simmering broth and rely on the flavor of the marrow dissolving into the broth.
Time Is Essential in Cooking Pho Broth
Perhaps the one thing that turns people off from making their own pho at home is the amount of time it takes to create the pho broth. There are stories of people hailing from Vietnamese immigrant parents all over the Internet, which say that their own mothers have given up making pho because of the time needed to cook it. If they want pho, they all go to a restaurant that serves pho to fulfill their craving for the dish.
How long should it take for beef bones to simmer in order to come up with a good pho broth? Mai Pham and Andrea Nguyen both recommend at least three hours to simmer the broth, but there are other recipes that state that the beef bones must be boiled gently for six to eight hours. For restaurant-quality pho, the time required to simmer the broth can take up to 12 hours or more.
Why is it necessary for the boiling to take that long? The explanation is simple: It takes time for the marrow in the bones to dissolve into the water. You cannot force it with shorter but harder boiling because a hard boil distorts the flavor of the pho broth. The flavor of the marrow is the essence of the broth; it must be brought out gently and doing so takes time.
The time it takes to create pho broth is definitely worth it, though, and you will end up with a broth that is so tasty you will want to slurp up every last drop. Some people resort to buying so-called pho broth cubes or canned pho broth, but the taste is just not the same. It is thin and watery compared to homemade or restaurant-made pho broth. I know, I know. Those are just quick fixes for a quick pho but I just had to mention them.
Pho is not pho without its broth. The broth is the element that gives pho its life and soul. If you can enjoy the pho broth wholeheartedly, then the rest of the ingredients in the bowl will be enjoyable too.
I cant find the meaning of pho xao (lan) & pho sot vang … can u help?)
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This article is just dumb long. Please leave out unnecessary info and show simple detailed instructions on how to make the broth.
Jeff: Thanks for your suggestion. Actually this article is not meant to teach people how to make pho broth. You may want to check out the recipes from this article:
Top Pho Bo and Pho Ga Recipes You Must Try Yourself.
How come when i cook the bones to make the soup base, my soup turns ivory right? Not clear.. It’s like a white soup that i can’t see more than 1/2 inch down?
How do i acheieve the clear soup??
Hello Hung: The key to clear pho broth is the parboiling of the bones. To borrow Andrea Nguyen’s instructions on parboiling bones for pho,
“Parboil bones. Place bones in stockpot (minimum 12-quart capacity) and cover with cold water. Over high heat, bring to boil. Boil vigorously 2 to 3 minutes to allow impurities to be released. Dump bones and water into sink and rinse bones with warm water. Quickly scrub stockpot to remove any residue. Return bones to pot.”
I can’t explain your “white” or “ivory” soup but you do need to parboil to get a clear pho broth. Good luck.
Hi Hung: You said “… I did parboil the bone for 10-15 minutes.. very little residue. But as i boil the soup.. the water becomes milky…”
Without addition information, and the specifics of your pot’s content, I can only suggest the following:
Once you start with new water, first bring it to boil over high heat, then lower the flame to gently simmer. During this time, use a ladle to skim the scum on the surface. Once simmering, add the remaining broth ingredients and cook 1 1/2 hours, or however long your recipe calls for. Then do whatever else your according to your recipe.
Again without specific details, I suggest that after parboiling, you bring it to a boil, then simmer and skim the scums. If you’re already doing this, then I’m not sure what else I can suggest. You sure you don’t have any “secret” ingredients in there that you didn’t share with us?
Is it absolutely neccessary to have a clear broth? I ask because I’ve seen recipes that don’t require par-boiling the bones which makes for a more “murky” broth, or I assume? Will this affect the taste? Honestly, I’m just an average Joe that loves Pho and looks and esthetics aren’t on my top list of Pho greatness (compared to flavor and ingredients, which I care most about).
Hi Craig: Yes there are many recipes that you can find online nowadays. That is not to say all of them are good and valid pho recipes. I would suggest you use recipes by the more respected food authors. But even so, do notice if the author really did describe his/her recipe as “fusion” or something similar, in which case the recipe is definitely not authentic.
I think most of us would agree that, regardless of how average you may be
, food should be enjoyed with all your senses, right? For pho, the bowl served to you should meet certain standards to be considered good quality pho, and clear broth is one of those qualities. “Murky” broth has its place in the world of noodle dishes, but pho is not one of those dishes. Pho broth should be clear from the simmering pot.
Just like any other crafts, making pho requires certain skills to make it right, not just in your personal kitchen to serve a few, but in a commercial kitchen to serve many paying patrons, day in and day out. I think you should eat only pho with clear broth when served. This article may help: “Pho Broth: The Soul of Vietnamese Pho.”
I think this article is PHENOMENAL!! I didn’t realize that one should take hours to simmer the beef bones. I think it’s very important to learn some history about this magnificent dish. Thank you so much, I absolutely love Pho after tasting it for the 1st time about 4yrs ago. Now I’d like to try it at home!
Hi jr: For the best taste it is best to simmer the bones, but many people do not/cannot do this anymore. But that should not prevent you from making your own great tasting pho at home. If you have trouble making your own good pho broth at home, try the Quoc Viet option. Their products may help you. See my article “Quick Beef Pho Recipe with Quoc Viet Foods’ Pho Soup Base.” Good luck.
The cause of white or ivory broth is too high temperature during boiling. The high temp emulsifies the marrow causing the white color. Its like taking a blender to the marrow and broth.
You don’t want to actually boil the bones. You want to very gently simmer. VERY GENTLY.
Hello PT: I agree. It’s really simple for those starting out. I always suggest to people who have unclear broth problem: you need to parboil the bones and meat first, then wash and bring them to a boil again. After that, simmer and skim the scums.
You say to char the garlic but I think you meant the ginger? There’s no garlic on your ingredients list!
I cannot believe that I can feel the smell of Pho in my room when I read your writing:) Yummy!
hi i was wondering how long is pho broth good for, if you refrigerate it?
Hi Alexis: Good catch, I did mean the ginger. It’s been changed. Thanks!
Hi melody: If you refrigerate your broth immediately after it cools down, I think it should last for 7 days or more in the refrigerator. The drawback is you’ll lose the initial fresh fragrance of the spices over time, but this is a minor drawback; no big deal. Assuming you’re making a big batch of broth (who would go through the trouble and then make only a small amount?) you can also try portioning your broth into smaller portions and freeze those, leaving only what you’ll enjoy in the next few days in the refrigerator. This way you can reheat what you want, and the frozen broth can be kept a long long time.
Hi Ann Do: Wow thank you for saying that! I would include pho fragrance with my website to all readers if there’s a technology to do that!
How do you make vegeterian pho?
I am vegeterian, How do you make vegeterian pho?
Hi Ellie: Making vegan pho is quite easy, and much cheaper than either beef or chicken pho. You can read this article here: Top Pho Bo and Pho Ga Recipes You Must Try Yourself. Good luck.
I’ve been starting to try to make my own pho broth at home. I use beef leg bones, knuckles and eye of round meat. My question is this – should the broth become gelatinous when refrigerated? Everytime I’ve brought pho home from a restaurant, the broth remains a liquid when refrigerated.
Hi Gene: A gelatinous broth when refrigerated is the sign of a very good and hearty broth, with good quality ingredients that can only be found in home-made broths and soups. So your broth is just fine. In fact that’s the way it should be. Your restaurant bought broth remains as a liquid because the restaurant probably did not use bone, marrow and cartilage in making it. Keep doing what you’re doing, it sounds tasty.
Thanks Cuong for reassuring me. After several batches of pho broth, there still seems to be something missing from the all around flavor compared to my favorite restaurants. I would hate to think that it’s MSG!! Any thoughts?
Gene: Do you have some good fish sauce in your recipe? If not try adding some. And how about sa sung as mentioned in an Andrea Nguyen’s post Pho Secret Ingredients: Dried Earthworms (Sa Sung)? Anyway in general, fish sauce, MGS, and a few others may get you the umami flavor you want.
yeah i agree with some of the above comments no one wants to read the pointless bs just tell us how to make pho and keep the rest to yourself
Hello h: That’s what I like! The passion about pho and making pho yourself. You can’t wait to get to the meat and bone of it (pun intended) to get your pho fix. Well I apologize that this article does not meet your needs. I would refer you to my 2 other sources to make your own pho broth. They are Top Pho Bo and Pho Ga Recipes You Must Try Yourself and Quick Beef Pho Recipe with Quoc Viet Foods’ Pho Soup Base.
Let me know how you did. And thanks to your excellent and spot on comment, I’ve put a note at the top of this article to help future visitors go to the correct articles if making pho is all they want.
Wow…thank you thank you thank you….wonderful website and exactly what I was looking for! My wife and I are foodies…travel for food and love learning new recipes.
I have long wondered how on earth they made this broth, I had ideas trying to deconstruct it, but I wasnt even close. Now I can finally do it the right way!
Mike: I’m glad you found information about Vietnamese pho broth you can use. I admire you for trying to deconstructing pho broth, a futile effort
but very deserving a big pat on the back, especially if you didn’t grow up in Vietnam where you may be more familiar with pho ingredients and their taste and function (I’m assuming you’re Caucasian; my apology if I’m wrong.) In any case, happy pho broth day to you Mike!
To make a clear broth follow these two steps;
1. Par-boil the boes for 5 minutes, rinse in cold water and then either wash your stock pot or place the bones in a second clean stock pot. Cover with cold water.
2. Bring to a simmer, not a full boil. A full boil will emulsify the bone marrow into the stock and make the stock coudy or milky. Especially if you are using the proper long marrow bones to make your stock.
Agree with what Mike said about making clear broth. Full boil or frequent/aggressive stirring or mixing of the broth during simmering will have the same effect to emulsify the bone marrow or other solids into the stock. Of course for home cooking, it is really up to the home chef to cook the way he/she likes to enjoy with a few people. For commercial restaurants, there is no excuse for serving murky pho broth to customers.
When SIMMERING bones. knuckles/ cartilage/ etc… What you are looking for is the melting point of collagen: 160F and HOLD it at that temperature for as long as possible. This where the “good things” happen and you are rewarded with a rich and bodied broth.
Crank you heat to high and impurities start to leach out into your broth, possibly even dissolving the calcium. Good broths and stocks cannot be rushed. The L O N G E R it goes at a l o w e r temperature is absolutely best.
Just my .02 cents, and as in brewing beer, in this soup
one of the main ingredients is the water. When I attempt
to make my Pho, I believe that I am going to utilize some
water that would similiarly brew the finest beer i.e. a
Light Pilsner where no flaws have room to hide….
@Dave
Absolutely TRUE! It is ideal to use at least filtered water (through a Brita or similar) and it DOES make a real difference. Also, one really should invest in stainless or stainless clad stock-pots. The best have a HEAVY diffusing disc of layered/ composite metal at the bottom and thinner walls; like the Italy Made Centurion line (not inexpensive but worth it).
@J-DuB: You are way too technical for my grandma (and many Vietnamese) to understand or care
, but what you shared is very helpful for many others, including newbies. From generation to generation and between family and friends, it’s always been “add this and cook that until this soft and add that and simmer the other for so and so hours until tender and until it tastes like this,” etc. But now that Vietnamese pho is “out of the bag” so to speak, many non-Viet start to take interest in pho and the way it’s done, so I’m glad that together we can bring this great comfort food to a much larger mass.
@Dave and @J-DuB: I understand your view, though I am not convinced filtered water will do much to pho broth, not the way it can do for beer anyway. In fact, if you don’t get the rest of the broth correct, filtered water will be a waste. In a restaurant, I’d rather they make the broth right, and I can drink the filtered water instead of the tap water they give me.
@Cuong: The whole idea with “filtered” is to just continue to use the best ingredients possible and realize the every ingredient; including the water you use or the pot you choose, makes a difference. Even if it’s very subtle in taste. As for technique; one wouldn’t necessarily have to even “boil/blanch bones/meats” first if you start your pot:
With COLD water, cover your ingredients and bring to simmer (160 F) and leave it at that for about as long as you want. So yes, one could even do this in a Crock Pot on LOW and let it go.
When making stocks/ broths, it’s very simple understanding of chemistry as well as a bit of physics.
Agitation and excessive heat… BAD. That’s why one ends up with cloudy stocks. When you heat up bones/ proteins/ connective tissue TOO much, you 1) break down the collagen too far and 2) you are dissolving other proteins that bind, say the calcium, in the bones and so leads to cloudy appearance as well as muddy flavor.
Once CAN clean up the broth by patient filtering through cheese-cloth. Then clarifying with; eggwhites whipped with Knox powdered geletan and some ground meat, but it’s a total pain in the ass.
Starting COLD, bringing up the target temperature s l o w l y, holding that target at 160F is a LOT easier than: Blanch and Wash and then make or trying to RUSH the process; taking the extra steps to correct.
Digital thermometers are CHEAP and very useful.
Oh and @Cuong… I LIKE your “pointless bs” and your “dumb long; unnecessary info”
@J-DuB: Ok this is where we part way on agreement. Blanching the bones and meats quickly before the broth making process begins serves a very important purpose in pho broth, and it may not be necessary in making other broths or soups. If you understand pho and the importance of its broth, then you’ll want to understand the importance of keeping the broth clear, and this is achieved through a combination of blanching the bones and meats before the actual simmering begins. Blanching is needed to take off impurities, tissues and blood on the outside of the bones and meats which don’t contribute to flavors but also make the broth dirty. You may or may not know of this clear broth requirement, but if you do then you do want to blanch.
The rest of what you say, of course one can do at home whatever one wants to. But I’ll just put things in perspective here:
In Vietnam, hardly anyone makes pho at home, only restaurants and pho shops make pho. Pho is best made in very large quantities to serve large number of people, and is not normally made to personal portions. In the U.S. nowadays, the convenience and technologies and higher income levels allow many people the chance to make pho at home and experiment with it, but these are at best made to personal tastes to serve a few. The way to judge pho is the mass population who eat them at pho shops that produce large quantities. The good shops will survive and the mediocre ones will vanish, while the so-so will just linger. When you do not boil or blanch bones and meats before making pho broth, you’ll end up with a so-so pot of pho at best.
@J-DuB: Not sure what you meant by this comment
I LIKE your “pointless bs” and your “dumb long; unnecessary info”
so I’ll assume you’re just trying to be funny. You come here to our site as a guest and I’m happy to have you as a guest. Otherwise if I have offended you in any way, then please let me know and I’ll have the issue corrected.
People above have made those comments. I was poking fun at the previous comments, not at you. Some of those previous comments are a little old and certainly did not mean to have it come across as “you have offended me” or I am trying to offend you”. I have respect for your blog/ articles.
I do know about “clear broth” and what it takes to achieve that. There are ways to simplify the process and still achieve a “clear broth”. The only thing one cannot do is: RUSH the simmering process.
Personally, I hope that people DO give a shot to making Pho at home, at least ONCE. The making of which helps to build good fundamental cooking skills and maybe people will be more “picky?” of what they eat.
@J-DuB: I got your points now. Thanks for clarifying. And thank you for the point of the message.
With respect to making pho at home, no doubt I agree with you here. People should know that making pho at home is very easy especially if you live in the U.S. or metro area where decent Asian supermarkets exist. When there is no Asian/Viet food ingredients is when you will have to resort to substitute ingredients and end up with “fusion” pho; which is totally ok to get your pho fix. This was exactly what my family and many Viet families had to do circa 1975 -1980 when the only choices were Chinese markets in distant cities from where we ended up in the U.S.
By the way, my friend and founder Brian Nguyen at Quoc Viet Foods has the same goal to help people make pho at home, and he has turned it into a successful business. His approach is somewhat different, where he provides good quality broth bases to help those too impatient or less knowledgeable to make pho from scratch. Unlike other soup bases on the market, Brian’s stuff is high quality and gives authentic flavors. Another beautiful part of his concept is he literally takes the ingredient availability factor out of the equation and provides pretty much everything in one package. This ensures all important flavors are there even if one cannot find the correct ingredients and spices in his/her locality. Anyway, it’s another way to make pho yourself at home.
i shall try making.. I have made tons of bone soup.. the longer you boil it, regardless of par boiling first, the milkier it looks and leaves the clear zone. this is the bone breaking down and is quite good for us with glucosamine etc
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