Pot Pho but 20% effort
Cooking doesn’t need to be hard or complicated. Often, you’re simply looking for a recipe that gets you most of the way there with minimal effort, hence 80/20.
Today we’re 80/20ing Vietnamese Pho, turning what might normally take 5-7 hours to prepare over stovetop to a little over 1 hour in an InstantPot. Traditionally, making pho calls for many steps like parboiling beef bones, charring aromatics over open fire or in an oven, roasting spices, and skimming fat off the broth for many hours.
Not everyone has the luxury of time or energy to make pho in this way, and of course if you do have time, you can always stay true to some of the traditional steps to improve the clarity, richness, and flavor of your broth, but I want to show you that you can still make an exceptional bowl of pho at home even if you commit what seems to be a cardinal sin of omitting almost all those steps.
Ingredients
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Spice Bag
Toppings
Directions
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- Add beef bones, shank or brisket, ginger, yellow onion, sugar, salt, water, and the pho spice bag into the InstantPot or pressure cooker.
- 2 lb beef bones (900 g)
- 2 lb beef shank (900 g)(or brisket)
- 6 inch ginger, whole (150 g)
- 1 yellow onion, peeled and halved (400 g)
- 2 tbsp white cane sugar (25 g)
- 2 tsp salt (12 g)
- 10 cup water (2400 g)
- 1 spice bag (37 g)(details below)
- Run the InstantPot or pressure cooker on High pressure for 45 minutes.
- While the Instant Pot is running, prepare your toppings and fresh pho noodles. Note: It's best to prepare the pho noodles near the end of the pressure cooking to prevent them from clumping. Keep in mind that fresh pho noodles only take about 10 seconds to cook in boiling water!
- 2 stalk green onions, chopped (30 g)
- 1/2 bundle cilantro (75 g)(or to taste)
- 1/2 yellow onion, thinly sliced (150 g)(or to taste)
- 1 bag bean sprouts (340 g)(or to taste)
- 4 tsp lime juice (20 g)(or to taste)
- 1 bundle thai basil, fresh (100 g)(or to taste)
- 4 bundle pho noodles, fresh (800 g)
- Once the Instant Pot finishes pressure cooking, remove the beef shank or brisket and set it aside to cool. Allowing the beef to cool will help it stay intact when you slice it for serving later.
- Strain the broth through a sieve into another pot.
- Season broth with chicken bouillon and fish sauce.
- 2 tbsp chicken bouillon (16 g)
- 2 tbsp fish sauce (32 g)
- [Optional] If you want to improve the clarity of your broth, I like using a Fat Separator to separate the fat from the broth.
- Prepare your bowls for serving by adding noodles, slices of beef shank, green onions, cilantro, bean sprouts, thinly sliced onions, basil, and lime. Feel free to customize with any additional toppings you like or omit those you prefer not to include.
- 4 bundle pho noodles, fresh (800 g)
- 1/2 yellow onion, thinly sliced (150 g)(or to taste)
- 1 bag bean sprouts (340 g)(or to taste)
- 2 stalk green onions, chopped (30 g)
- 1/2 bundle cilantro (75 g)(or to taste)
- 4 tsp lime juice (20 g)(or to taste)
- 1 bundle thai basil, fresh (100 g)(or to taste)