October 2009 Daring Cooks’ Challenge: Vietnamese Chicken Pho

The October 2009 Daring Cooks’ challenge was brought to us by Jaden of the blog Steamy Kitchen. The recipes are from her new cookbook, The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook.

Pho!

I've never made Vietnamese food before, so this was truly daring! Until I realized I had all the ingredients on hand to make it--then it became less daring. As a person who loves Asian cuisine, I tend to have the pantry staples required to make an Americanized stir fry, or a nice rice dish. Heck, I even have a liter of fish sauce! How many white people have a liter of fish sauce that they don't curse every time they open the fridge? "What possessed me to buy an entire liter of fish sauce for that Thai recipe....I should just throw it away... but that would be wasteful. What if I need it again?" And so it sits, taking up precious space in the door of the fridge, staring at you, daring you to use it.

Luckily, I use mine frequently but a LITER is excessive. When I shop the Asian markets, I am surprised by the size of the packaging on staples items. Example: gochujang, a delicious spicy fermented pepper paste. I have a hand sized container, which typically takes us about a year to go through. But, there's an even tinier, Barbie-toy sized version all the way up in size to the 5 gallon bucket (NO JOKE) economy size for what I could only assume would be a massive Korean church barbecue.

Asian ingredients are more of a staple item in our household than most American items. Except cheese, of course. My long winded point is that I was able to make the pho for dinner the night the recipe was released! How's that for convenient!

First, we absolutely have to start with homemade chicken stock!!



I freeze my stock into cubes for easy measuring. It's so nice to know that 10 of my cubes equals one cup of liquid. CONVENIENCE IS PARAMOUNT! Especially when I spent a whole day MAKING the stock--time saved later is an epic WIN.


Smashing ginger is more rewarding than trying to mince it fine, but less rewarding than taking a microplane zester and shredding it to mush. I also have no idea what was up with these onions, but they made my eyes burn like I had just been in some kind of protest and doused with pepper spray. It was like Niagara Falls, baby. I had to stop and splash my face and clean my glasses. The tears were not welcomed.



I saved the chicken from the carcass I boiled for the homemade stock. Super tender, super juicy, and just right for pho!


And here are all the members of the cast: red onion, cilantro, chicken, lime wedges, rooster sauce, bean sprouts, hoisin, and delicious delectable broth. Well, and noodles, but they were busy working the curtain and didn't want to take a bow. But they are featured in the next scene.

Ingredients:

For the Chicken Pho Broth:
2 tbsp. whole coriander seeds
4 whole cloves
2 whole star anise
2 quarts (2 liters/8 cups/64 fluid ounces) store-bought or homemade chicken stock
1 whole chicken breast (bone in or boneless)
½ onion
1 3-inch (7.5 cm) chunk of ginger, sliced and smashed with side of knife
1 to 2 tbsps. sugar
1 to 2 tbsps. fish sauce

1 lb. (500 grams/16 ounces) dried rice noodles (about ¼ inch/6 mm wide)

Accompaniments:

2 cups (200 grams/7 ounces) bean sprouts, washed and tails pinched off
Fresh cilantro (coriander) tops (leaves and tender stems)
½ cup (50 grams/approx. 2 ounces) shaved red onions
½ lime, cut into 4 wedges
Sriracha chili sauce
Hoisin sauce
Sliced fresh chili peppers of your choice

Directions:

1. To make the Chicken Pho Broth: heat a frying pan over medium heat. Add the coriander seeds, cloves and star anise and toast until fragrant, about 3-4 minutes. Immediately spoon out the spices to avoid burning.
2. In a large pot, add all the ingredients (including the toasted spices) and bring to a boil.
3. Reduce the heat to medium-low and let simmer for 20 minutes, skimming the surface frequently.
4. Use tongs to remove the chicken breasts and shred the meat with your fingers, discarding the bone if you have used bone-in breasts.
5. Taste the broth and add more fish sauce or sugar, if needed. Strain the broth and discard the solids.
6. Prepare the noodles as per directions on the package. I used delicious Trader Joe's Rice Sticks.
   
7. Ladle the broth into bowls. Then divide the shredded chicken breast and the soft noodles evenly into each bowl.
8. Have the accompaniments spread out on the table. Each person can customize their own bowl with these ingredients.