10 Top Tips for Creating Restaurant-Quality Phở at Home

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It’s a paradox of war: Despite the ways the U.S. waged a brutal campaign in Vietnam, the privilege of Americans getting to enjoy Vietnamese national cuisine only grew in response. War causes displacement. The diasporas that emerge evolve to mean different things for different people. The common thread, of course, is the cultural and culinary wake that travels, too. 50 years after the fall of Saigon, Vietnamese cuisine, and phở in particular, has shown how impactful this exchange can be.

Vietnamese immigration to the U.S. grew greatly during the 1970s. Phở shops followed. Initially, they served communities that were far from home, while racism and public perception likely contributed to the dish not gaining widespread popularity with white Americans until the ’90s. Since then, phở has gained great importance, becoming a touchstone with which to discuss cultural progress. These days, phở shops number even with Starbucks locations in Seattle, and there are almost 8,000 Vietnamese restaurants in the U.S. Chances are you have your own local favorite — but that you’ve also wondered how to make restaurant-quality phở at home.

Enter chef Helene An. An awardee of the Smithsonian Museum’s Pioneer Award in Culinary Arts, few chefs have done more to mainstream Vietnamese cuisine as she has. An’s fusion cooking has brought people a new understanding of Vietnamese food, but she’s held off on serving her own phở recipe at her Beverly Hills-based restaurant, Crustacean, until recently. We spoke with An about what makes a restaurant-worthy phở. Among tips for balancing flavor, using the proper equipment, and getting your noodles right, she reminded us of one thing. “Serve it hot. Phở is a gift best enjoyed steaming, fragrant, alive.”

Of course, to start a phở, you have to start with the right tools along with an idea of how to build the dish. It begins with phở broth. “At home, I normally use a 14- to 16-quart heavy-bottomed stock pot,” says chef Helene An. Since the dish requires you to blanch and then slow-simmer marrow bones, you’ll need something of quality. Don’t be tempted to take shortcuts when building your broth, though.

“Some chefs use a pressure cooker, but I still believe in time over tech,” says An. Considering that a 24-hour broth is considered the hallmark of a well-made southern Vietnamese phở, time it will take you indeed.

While your bones and aromatics are simmering, there will undoubtedly be impurities and foam that releases into your broth. For this reason, An says a fine mesh skimmer is indispensable to keep at hand. Another tool that can keep your broth operation tight and clean is cheesecloth. Using it to tie the aromatics up in a bundle will prevent them from “roaming freely in your broth,” per An.

Phở is a dish where many individual parts combine to make a whole. According to Helene An, some of those pieces may be considered a bit more spiritual than others: “The broth is the soul of phở,” she told us. As such, it’s very important to make sure you’re preparing yours correctly. That starts with the bones.

Chef An is specific about what types of bones should be used for various types of phở. The bones she recommends — beef knuckle, bone marrow, and oxtail for phở bò (beef phở) or chicken breast bones for phở gà (chicken phở) — will determine from the start how your broth is going to shake out. Make sure you’re sourcing them from a reputable provider (like a butcher at your local farmers market). In particular, the best bones you can use for phở bò will be a little more gelatinous and may potentially have some meat hanging around. If you’re in the store and can’t find knuckles or marrow bones labeled specifically, check for packages labeled “soup bones.” Regardless of the type of phở you’re making, none of the bones should ever look dried out or severely cracked before you’ve cooked them. 

Once you’ve gotten them sourced, it’s time to cook. An suggests roasting the broth bones, a step which ignites the Maillard reaction and deepens the potential flavor. After this, you may be tempted to start steeping your bones right away, but that would be a mistake. Per An, if you want your phở to taste restaurant-made, you need to blanch the bones before simmering to remove impurities.

Sourcing, roasting, blanching — all this comes before you’ve even gotten the first ingredient of the dish completed. If the process of making phở sounds lengthy, that’s because it is. Chef Helene An recognizes this. “Don’t rush the broth,” she told us plainly. A common thread that ties all of her phở tips together is a respect for time as an ingredient.

So, how long should you expect to cook your phở broth for? “Simmer for at least nine hours,” says An. You should know before you start that phở gà can cook a bit faster, so it makes a better starting point. Again, if you started from scratch but have grown weary at this point, resist taking a shortcut. Keep the heat low and slow. As An tells us, boiling too aggressively is one of the biggest mistakes you can commit during the broth process. “Let it whisper,” she says. You’ll taste the results.

Beyond An’s expert advice, there are plenty of reasons in culinary science to simmer rather than boil your broth. Boiling in and of itself can release a lot of the flavors that you’re looking for; however, it makes it more likely that volatile flavor compounds will escape with the high levels of steam that rise from your pot. That’s not the only reason you should avoid boiling, though.

When you cook bones in hot water, regardless of whether you blanched or didn’t, there will be some soup scum released into the mix. A hard, raucous boil is going to reintegrate that scum back into your soup pot, causing the mix to remain murky in color and flavor. Alternatively, a slower approach gives you more chances to employ that fine mesh strainer.

Among the various types of phở that exist in the world, phở chay, or vegetarian phở, is a world of complexity, creativity, and tradition all unto itself. It can contain all sorts of ingredients: oyster mushrooms, enoki mushrooms, tofu, broth made of root vegetables, cabbage, and so on. A subtle sweetness is added with fruit. Carefully considered aromatics and seasonings bring bitterness, sourness, and salinity to taste. Your tip to making a restaurant-worthy phở chay, according to chef Helene An? Avoid this common mistake: “Making it too flat. Layer it like a symphony — savor and sustain.”

Phở chay is excellent because it’s quick, relative to phở broth made from beef or chicken. You can bring a broth to fruition with only three to four hours of simmering. You’ll save time, but you should still reserve some to spend mise en placing your ingredients. That way, you’ll be prepared to add items at different timings in different layers.

Common seasonings that you’ll want to toast first might include cinnamon and cassia, anise, and clove. After they’re nice and warm, you replace them with aromatics to be charred, like daikon radish, jicama, onion, and ginger. Once they’re browned, they’re in with the water, seasonings, and fruits and vegetables. Some of An’s recommended ingredients for a phở chay include apples, pears, and browned chayote. Corn, leeks, and mushrooms can also build and round out the flavor. Just make sure to add them bit by bit.

Understandably, phở isn’t a super accessible dish to try at home unless you have nine hours minimum to watch a broth. Oh, and don’t forget a few more to source and prepare all the ingredients. It adds up. Using a store-bought broth isn’t phoning it in; it’s doing the best you can with what you have. There are always methods to make a store-bought broth taste closer to being restaurant-worthy.

Most of chef Helene An’s suggestions start with a hot skillet. “Toast your spices and add them in,” says An. She recommends fennel and cardamom here. Rock salt and sugar are other seasonings to consider, but they won’t need to be heated. “Char some onion and ginger,” she says. “If you can add marrow bones or even a bit of roasted veggies, do it.” A little bit of time can do wonders here; An recommends an hour-long simmer to let the flavors of everything meld.

There’s a market of phở broth starters these days. Ocean’s Halo, Good & Gather — even Campbell’s has a ready-to-go phở broth in a carton. Each of these has its own profile when it comes to flavor and nutrition. Some of them contain spices and aromatics already, so try different cartons to see what you prefer to work with. If you’re looking for a brand that can help you skip cooking the bones entirely, a popular one to look for in Asian markets is Quốc Việt Foods, which sells pre-seasoned broth concentrate.

Being the largest part of the soup (by volume) and the part that requires the most time, the broth naturally gets a lot of the attention when it comes to phở. When making phở with beef, chicken, or some other animal protein, the meat should be considered just as closely … if you want to make something that tastes of restaurant quality, that is.

When it comes to phở gà, there aren’t so many different options. Most recipes will call for breast or thigh meat (though there is phở lòng gà, which utilizes gizzards). On the flip side, your phở bò options are much more plentiful. Sometimes, brisket is employed, but pieces of chuck roast are also in the lineup. In many phở shops across the U.S., tripe or beef meatballs are common offerings. Mostly, flank steak is the quintessential cut to use, given that it’s thin and can be cooked in the hot broth. For chef Helene An, the occasion calls for a cut that can raise the profile of your dish — and open up a window into different phở styles.

“I personally adore a rich phở that I make at home called phở xào lăn,” she says. Served with white onions, celery, and leeks, phở xào lăn is a stir-fried version that might be good for first-timers, considering that it doesn’t require broth. With only a savory sauce to rely on, phở xào lăn practically demands a cut of meat that shows up impressively. For An, the choice has to be filet mignon — A5 Wagyu, if you can get it.

For some home cooks out there, making a dish from scratch means making every single thing yourself — including the hard parts. Making rice noodles at home is a worthy challenge to set for yourself, so long as you remember that this is the most particular part of the process. “Rice noodles are delicate,” says chef Helene An. “It’s an art within itself.” She reveals that even she doesn’t usually make hers from scratch, since the process has a lot of variables to tinker with.

The process of making rice noodles goes something like this: A batter of rice flour, tapioca starch, and water gets mixed together. A large pot is filled and set to boil while another pan is placed over top. Batter is poured into the pan, and then everything is covered while the mix steams. The end result is a rice sheet you can cut into noodle shape.

“These noodles are like fine fabric — they require a perfect environment,” says An. “The room must be humid enough while the batter is resting. The steam must be consistent while it’s cooking. Thus, creating a perfect, light, rice noodle is not easy to achieve [consistently].” If you plan to make your own, make sure to crank up the internal temperature, or consider this a recipe for a hot day.

For most of us — chef Helene An included — rice noodles are a bit too fussy of an endeavor to take part in every time we want to cook phở. Fortunately, there are loads of brands out there making high-quality, true-to-form rice noodles. For An, the expeditious way of sourcing noodles has been to partner with a local maker for her signature phở. You could try this as well, but if the grocery store remains easiest, An also recommends a few ready-to-cook noodle brands, like Three Ladies Brand, or Caravelle.

Although Three Ladies Brand sells many products that are ingredients in Thai cuisine, the Vietnam-based exporter does sell traditional Vietnamese soup noodles as well. Called bánh phở, these noodles are wider than matchstick noodles or vermicelli, though the company does offer those options too, in case you like your noodles on the thin side.

Caravelle also sells a wide variety of shaped and sized rice noodles, but the company also works in regional differences as well. For example, the company markets a pack of rice noodles known as bánh phở mỹ tho, which are typically used in a different type of soup dish from the Mekong Delta. While your phở noodles should always be flat and square, there are some options to play with if you want to try slurping different shapes.

By now, chef Helene An has made it clear that rice noodles are different in their delicacy. With proper care and attention paid to how you’ve made or sourced them, the last thing you want to do is get a little negligent with how they are cooked. Per An, there are two things to know about rice noodles:

“A quick, one-second blanch is all you need for fresh noodles before you pour the broth in,” says An. “For dried noodles, always soak them in warm water for 30 minutes before blanching for three seconds.” If that sounds quick, that’s because it is. One of the main reasons rice noodles become mushy is because of drastic overcooking. Blanching noodles is much the same as blanching vegetables. You want to reheat the noodles — make them come alive — without simmering them to slop. Use a rolling boil and keep a pot of ice-cold water handy — or use ice-cold running tap water to shortcut blanching.

Once your rice noodles are in the pot, another common mistake to prevent is clumping. If your broth and protein aren’t ready, a small dash of oil can keep the sticky noodles separate while you’re assembling the dish. Overall, An’s biggest tip here is not to let your phở just hang around once it’s been put together. “Don’t let [the noodles] sit in the soup too long before eating,” she reminds us. “They’ll soak up the broth and lose their grace.”

One of the things that binds phở everywhere is that regardless of how it’s made, some sort of post-serving accoutrement is going to come with it. That said, the condiments and accompaniments that come with a restaurant-worthy bowl of phở will vary, depending on where you travel in Vietnam, or what regional variation is being served to you in the U.S. “For the purists — black pepper and a lime wedge are enough,” says chef Helene An. If you like yours with a bit more punch, she has some other options: fish sauce, hoisin sauce, sriracha, and chopped white onions and cilantro should always be on the table.

When An is topping her phở, white onions actually show up twice. To add texture and contrast, she recommends including sliced, pickled onions on your garnish plate. Some other things that your restaurant-worthy phở should come along with? “Sawtooth coriander (ngo gai), Thai basil, bean sprouts, lime wedges, and sliced chili,” says An. With the right pairings, your next at-home bowl of phở can be as good as that of any phở shop on the block.