Pressure Cooker Vietnamese Pho Bo

Sunshine_Celine's Note:

Vietnamese has to be my favourite cuisine -- and I am always looking for great Pho, this wonderful beef broth eaten with rice noodles. I had searched and searched for an easy at home recipe but it should really brew for hours!! One day, I was watching Alton Brown make beef stock on TV using a pressure cooker - and voila! This recipe was born - and believe me it tastes just like the real thing!

• Total Time: 1 hrs 10 mins
• Prep Time: 20 mins
• Cook Time: 50 mins

Ingredients:

Serves: 4

Yield: 4.0 steamin ...

• 2 lbs beef bones
• 1 lb beef brisket
• 1 piece ginger, 6 inches long
• 1 large onion
• 4 star anise
• 6 cloves
• 1 cinnamon stick, 6 inches long
• 10 cups fresh water, filtered
• 3 tablespoons fish sauce
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon sugar (rock sugar if available)
• 1 tablespoon black pepper
• 2 cups bean sprouts
• 2 spring onions, sliced
• 1 fresh chili pepper, sliced
• 1 lime
• 1 bunch basil
• 300 g rice noodles

Directions:

1. Peel the ginger and the onion, and char them on an open flame or under a broiler until well blackened. Set aside.
2. In the pressure cooking, brown the meat slowly in batches to give it a good colour. Set aside.
3. Clean the pot, return the meat, ginger, onion, star anise, cloves, cinnamon and water. Set on high heat.
4. Bring back to the boil then skim the scum that will have risen at the top. Close the pressure cooker.
5. When your pressure cooker is 'steaming', reduce the heat to low and cook for 50 minute.
6. When time is up - release the pressure, keep the piece of brisket warm - discard the rest. But keep the stock!
7. Skim as much fat as you can from he stock - then return to the pot and add the fish sauce, salt, sugar and black pepper.
8. Bring back to the boil and add the noodles. Cook the noodles in the broth until ready.
9. Serve steaming hot with the rest of the condinments on the side. Enjoy!

Reviews

[Chef #1531963]

This was really very good. Still not quite as rich as the pho at our local Vietnamese restaurant, but the best homemade I've had. Perhaps the beef marrow bones I used were too big, maybe I should have used the sliced ones to get more surface area. I did the browning of the bones and brisket in the broiler since it was already in use for the ginger and onion. I tied the star anise, cloves and cinnamon (I used two 3" pieces) in cheesecloth to make it easier to get them back out at the end. We assumed the brisket was supposed to be sliced up and added to the soup bowls. It didn't quite slice, more like shredded, but was good, although different than the barely cooked paper-thin slices of beef you get at a restaurant. I fried up some frozen cha gio from the Asian market to round out the meal. We all enjoyed it very much.