Traditional Pho (Instantpot)

Let me preface this by stating that This is a recipe I learned from an old Vietnamese lady I knew who ran a small shop that largely served the local Vietnamese community. The only changes I have ever made were quantities to suit taste and the size of my pot. I spent years making it in a large 80 quart pot the traditional slow cooked method before adapting it to the instant pot. This recipe is for the 8 Quart Instant pot. If you have a smaller one, you will need to play with the amounts. Also one last note, Never ever use the pre made pho spice packs. Individually they are expensive and frankly just terrible. Especially the powdered ones. You will never achieve an authentic taste using them. Yes it is a bit of an expense purchasing all the whole spices at first, but if you find them in bulk at a local asian market, you will get dozens of batches out of them and in the end be far cheaper.

Ingredients:

6 Beef Soup or Marrow bones

1-2 Beef Tendon (Even if you don't eat it, this is necessary)

4-6 pieces of Beef short rib (You can use lots of things here, but I find these offer the best flavor for the size of the batch).

1 Yellow/white/spanish or other non sweet onion. Do not use a sweet onion.

1 Ginger root approx the size of your hand

1-2 Shallot

2 Tbsp Coriander

2-4 Star Anise pods to taste

4-6 Cloves

4-6 Cardamon pods

2 Vietnamese cinnamon shards that are approx 2" long or if those are difficult to find use 1 4" roll of Ceylon Cinnamon. I use the Ceylon because it is all my asian market stocks and I can buy large bags of it cheap. It has lots of thin layers. Standard Cassia which is the small hard thick roll you are most familiar with is too strong and has the wrong flavor.

Approx 2 TBSP Yellow Lump Rock Candy (You can use regular sugar in a pinch, but really if you found everything else on this list you can find this).

1/2 cup three Crabs brand Fish sauce.

Par Boil your Bones, Tendon and shortrib for approx 10 minutes at a full boil to get all the scum off them. Drain and Rinse after it appears nothing else is coming off. Fair warning you will need to use a pot that has at least 2-3" of space between the top of the water and the top of the pot. Once rinsed place all in your empty instant pot. Char your Onion, Ginger (cut in half) and Shallot until at least 1/3rd of them is blackened. This is easiest done on a Gas burner, grill or with a kitchen torch as you are looking to char not cook. In a pinch put your oven rack as close to the top as possible and put under a high broiler. Place these in your instant pot and fill to its full line with water. Toast your spices over medium heat until fragrant and wrap in some form of spice bag (I just use cheese cloth and tie up with twine). The cinnamon is fairly large so it can just go directly in the pot, be warned the ceylon will fragment a little so be aware when serving you may have to fish a few pieces out. Once your spices are toasted and in a bag, toss them in your pot with the 1/2c fish sauce.

Put your lid on, select pressure cook and set time to 1 hour 30 minutes. By the time it comes up to pressure and depressurizes after the total time will be 2 hours to 2h:25m. At this point taste and add fish sauce and salt to taste. Prepare whatever add ins you want and serve. The broth itself can be frozen and kept for months to be easily heated up for a quick bowl of Pho. I also encourage you to slice the tendon up and give it a try. I know many of you will have never tried that and trust me I had reservations about it at first as well. It is really delicious and buttery and adds a great dimension to the dish. I hope this is clear enough as I'm not used to telling people how to make it. This is just something I've made for the better part of 10 years now.

One last thing, Before serving traditionally they skim the fat off as the goal is the clearest broth possible. You can do this if you wish, but personally that fat contains a bunch of flavor and I'm more interested in that than I am presentation. Also once done you can throw the onion, shallot, ginger all away as everything of value has been cooked out of them.

bon appetit