Lemongrass and Ginger Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup - Pho


I'm BAAAAAAACCCCCCKKKKKKKK!

I bet you all really missed me???

(Tumble weed........)

Seriously though, if anyone is still reading this, I am VERY grateful! 2014 so far has been amazing - but not a good one for blogging - so far! Our wedding, on the 31.05.14 was quite literally the best day of my (our) life (lives). More on that later.

In the lead up to the wedding, I was literally a crazed women, and spent my every waking moment (which were for sure, far more than my sleeping ones) thinking about the wedding. Needless to say I (thought I) had little time to even think about food (!!!!), let alone cook it, or blog about it. My future husband, was quite literally a trooper, and what he didn't do in terms of wedding planning, he certainly made up with feeding me delish food every day and countless cuddles. Worth its weight in gold.

So now we have been married nearly 3 whole months and I've just about got back into the groove in the kitchen. And just about ready to jump back onto the blog band wagon.

Dipping my toes in lightly here (apparent from my lazy iPhone photo's) this soup is just something we knocked together tonight with leftovers from a spectacular roast we had yesterday. The weather is so absolutely grim outside today that something spicy, hot and zingy is exactly what we needed. Ginger, garlic, chili, lemongrass, lots and lots of fresh herbs, every slurp is absolutely delicious. This is so beautifully simple, most of the hard work was done when we made the roast yesterday, but even if you don't have leftovers you could make this so quickly which some good pre-bought beef stock and maybe some thinly sliced steak (maybe minute?) poached in the stock at the last minute.


Lemongrass and Ginger Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup

Serves 2


You need about 750ml to 1l beef stock here. How you make this up depends on how strongly flavoured you like it. I used about 750ml of our home-made beef stock and topped it up with water as didn't want it too strongly beef flavoured. I used home made beef stock here, made with beef bones, carrot, celery, onion, bay, thyme and peppercorns. You could absolutely use good quality shop bought instead though.

Ingredients

750ml - 1l beef stock
2 inch piece of ginger
1 stalk of lemongrass
1 small red chilli
1 clove of garlic
coriander stalks
splash of fish sauce to taste
splash of soy sauce to taste

300g approx cooked beef thinly sliced (or similar amount of uncooked steak)

200g rice stick noodles
150g purple sprouting broccoli
2 large handfuls of bean sprouts
1 small bunch of coriander, chopped
1 small bunch of mint, chopped
4 spring onions, finely chopped
Crispy shallots (I get these from our local oriental supermarket, but you can also make them)
lime wedges

Sriarcha to serve

Method

Add the beef stock (and water if using) to a medium saucepan over a medium heat. Peel the ginger and slice into £1 inch slices, add to the stock. Bash the lemongrass with the back of a knife, chop into thirds and add that too. Chop the chilli in half, peel the garlic and chop that in half, add these and the coriander stalks. Add the fish sauce and soy sauce. Heat the stock to a simmer and leave on whilst you prep the rest of the ingredients.

Pour boiling water over the noodles and leave for approx. 7 minutes. Blanch the sprouting broccoli in boiling salted water for 2 minutes and drain. 

When you have everything ready, strain the stock, removing the ginger etc. Pour the stock back into the pan over a medium heat again and add the beef to the stock to heat through for a couple of minutes (or if using raw beef, similarly add now and poach for a couple of minutes).

Warm your bowls, add the bean sprouts, noodles, broccoli. Ladle over the hot stock. Top with the beef slices, the coriander, mint, spring onions, crispy shallots and lime wedges. Squeeze over as much Sriarcha as you can handle and slurp away!


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