Vietnamese chicken noodle soup ("phở gà")

My first house in Hanoi was on Thuy Khue St, right next to the park facing Quan Thanh and Thanh Nien. For those who know the city well, the street of Thuy Khue runs parallel with Hoang Hoa Tham from address No.1 to No. 600, wrapping nearly a quarter of West Lake. The street was famous for many things, from "Bao Phuong," one of Hanoi's oldest mooncake bakeries, or Chu Van An, arguably the city's best public high school, and no doubt, an array of street foods. My house was on No.2, the famous Vietnam Feature Film Studio (VFS-"Hãng Phim Việt Nam") was on No.4, and next to the studio was a pho place, "Cồ Cử." It was not all that famous when I was growing up, but now Cồ Cử is a signature pho place in the city. The scent of pho pervaded my childhood, but not until I moved to the US, I realized what a huge privilege it was to live close by a pho place.

We stayed in Thuy Khue for 12 years until I entered middle school in another district, and my family moved me closer to my school at the time, Hanoi-Amsterdam. We could no longer walk a few steps for the noodle soup, so my family made it a tradition to have pho at home a few times a month. Each time, my mom would still go back to a small store on Thuy Khue St. that specializes in fresh pho noodles. No soup. Just the rice noodles. But they were known over generations just for that supply chain.

Pho is the soul of Vietnam. Nothing relates as much as a good bowl of pho. Still now, I can still tell right away from the smell if a pho broth is not right. Broth determines 80% of pho's success. The broth should be so clear that you could see all the way to the bottom. The smell should unveil all layers of spices: ginger, star anise, cinnamon and black cardamoms. When combined with the chewy noodles, the tender meat, the acidity of lime or vinegar, the kick of chili, pho should feel comforting like home.

In this recipes, you would find no fish sauce, sugar, or MSG. The only seasoning was sea salt. I am rather a traditionalist when it comes to Vietnamese cooking. Sometimes we need to tone down the urge to add, to fix and keep fixing, and for pho, less is exactly more: we leave space for the flavor to develop on its own.

Pho is simple, genuine, and strikingly good. Isn't that all we strive for in life?

Ingredients

To make 4 servings:

- Half a chicken, air-chilled*. We used Bell & Evans brand from Whole-Foods.

*: In the US, most chicken is chilled by being submerged in cold water, which causes the meat to absorb extra liquid (hence the "rubbery chicken breast").

Air-chilled chicken is cooled by passing the birds through several chambers of cold, purified air- resulting in less retained water, better absorbed flavor and less chance for contamination. When roasting or boiling whole chicken, air-chilled meat is the preferred item of choice.

**: Always let your chilled chicken return to room temperature before cooking.

- Half a standard package of wide rice noodles. Due to COVID, we just picked whichever brand we saw at Hmart. Ideally, you want something a bit wider than linguine, ideally the size of fettuccine. Pad thai noodles will suffice.

- Spices

2 black cardamoms

4 star anise

2 whole cinnamon sticks

1 large shallot

1 large ginger

- Garnish:

Scallions, finely chopped

Cilantro, optional

Instructions

Step 1: Grill all whole spices.

Step 2: Clean the chicken.

Scrape off the yellow skin and remove any feathers. Slice the chicken in half, remove extra fat pouch. Rub coarse sea salt against the skin of the chicken. Rinse in cold water and pat dry with paper towels.

Step 3: Make the broth.

Place the chicken inside the pot, skin up. Pour a generous amount of coast sea salt on the skin (depending on the size of the chicken, 1-1.5 tbsp). Add cold, purified water, then all grilled spices:

Step 4: Once the chicken has boiled, turn down the heat. While the chicken is simmered, boil the noodles like how you would boil noodles.

Step 5: Let simmer for another 20 minutes.While simmering, do not stir the pot. Stirring will cloud the broth. If there is too much fat, you might want to skimp it as well.

Insert a chopstick through the thickest slab of meat (i.e. the breast), if there is no red liquid, the chicken is cooked.

Don't forget to strain the gunk and excess fat. You might have to do this frequently until the chicken is cooked all the way through.

Step 6: Finely chop the herbs.

Step 7: Place cooked noodles into a bowl. Layer sliced meats on top.

Layer more cilantro to garnish. Don't forget to cover the sliced chicken with plastic wrap to keep it moist.

Step 8: Pour the boiling broth and serve. The scallion and cilantro would get cooked right away. Squeeze fresh lime juice and if you're brave, add fresh chili. Enjoy right away!

I hope you enjoy this homemade chicken pho! If you make any stock right, the broth will gelatinize when it cools down. Pho sounds complicated, but you have seen today that this delicacy takes less than 10 ingredients and only less than 2 hours to make. Don't let my recipes feeds only your eyes, try this at home and let me know how you like it! Cheers!

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