I have been hardcore craving clear soup lately,
and Pho is something I felt like I never could get right until today. The recipe and some pictures will be described here. Tips and tricks are welcome in comments.
The best Vegan Pho I have had before today was from Magasin on Magazine St in New Orleans, but to be fair, I have only had Pho in Louisiana.
Regardless, I know when something tastes good, and I am the type of person who is willing to be irreverent to tradition to get what is good out of life.
Their VEGAN Pho was better than any MEAT Pho I'd had, and it still stands. I had, over and over, it at a wonderful wedding fest[ival] at Race and Religion of an admirable Dr friend of mine, renowned for his work in alleviating the AIDS conditions in NOLA.
That experience inspired me to seek out the best Pho I could. What an incredible Pho it was...
When looking at this recipe I also read this comment:
I love this as a base recipe, but I made one small change to it. After doubling the recipe size (we really love pho), I actually added a flat of shiitake mushrooms and simmered the soup for the traditional 6-8 hours. Vegetable broth alone isn't enough to replicate the savory flavor of pho, even when combined with the spices. Shiitake is often used by religious vegetarian communities in China and Southeast Asia to replicate a beefy, umami-type flavor in foods, so this is actually a very accurate substitution to make. I used a propane blow torch to scorch my veggies and I tied the spices into a bouquet garni (again, another relatively accurate thing to do, given the French occupation). Other than that, the recipe is amazing. The spices are spot-on perfect. I used to live in Thailand, where we have a similar soup that we just use flat noodles in, and the taste is perfect.
which caught my eye because I had been searching things like "incredibly savory vegan pho" and "vegan pho broth from scratch," and that was my main concern: willing to seek out ingredients, however "strange."
Broth:
- 32 cups (~7.6L) of water
- 2 white onions
- 2-3 Thumbs of Ginger
- 8-12 medium sized carrots
- 2 pods of garlic
- 1 handful of dried morel mushrooms
- ~1 lb (454g) of shittake mushrooms, fresh
- 2-3 stalks of lemon grass cut into 3-4 sections
- dashes of Chinese 5 Spice
- 4-5 whole cloves for luck
- 1 tsp black pepper
- 1 poof of cinnamon (with gusto, but not vigor ;P)
- 2 table spoons of black pepper (literally, not the unit of measurement tbsp)
- 1-2 Tbsp of toasted sesame oil
- Sattvic Salt and prob about 1/8 - 3/16 cup of Organic Tamari
For the Soup:
- Bahn Pho
- 1.5 lb (680g) of 26/30 Shrimp
- ~0.5 lb of Shittake mushrooms
- 1 lb (454g) of Broccoli Florets
- Bunch of curly kale
- 1/2 Lime
Garnish: (all fresh)
- Thai Basil
- Cilantro
- Lime Juice
- Poblano Pepper
- Mung Bean Sprouts
Implementation:
First, get your water on the stove to boil. Big pots of water can take a long time to boil.
Then, I cut white onions into quarters and minced ginger, then arranged on a pan an drizzled with olive oil. I made sure that all of the ginger was soaked in oil by mixing the minced mass and oil.
I put that into the oven to broil at 500 for 5 then 7 more minutes. Watch carefully, as you only want the onion to burn a little bit.
You can be the judge of how much you want through practice.
Chances are you will have a lot of time to prep your broth veggies, spices, and fungi. Go ahead and do that with love and care, honoring the life you are soon to consume.
I cut the carrots into 3-inch chunks and put in a dry holding bowl. Then I pulled off the loose skin on the garlic pods, removed the hard parts, and roughly sliced or clean cut pieces, trying to maintain a particular volume to surface area ratio.
A handful of dried morels, harvested in Colorado by my brother. They smell of savory chocolate. The majority of a flat of fresh shittake, whole.
Lemon grass stalks, cut into 3-4 pieces. All of the ingredients are placed in the same bowl to await water boiling.
I boiled these ingredients for 45 minutes, and then added spices, sugar, salt, and sauce. I continued to simmer the pot for another 1.5 hrs and let sit for another 30 mins without adding heat, for my safety.
With my sister's help, I poured the broth through a sieve she was holding. I put the Broth back on the stove in the original pot, and recombined the boiled mushrooms and onion (cut to bite-sized pieces before adding).
I prepared the soup ingredients as follows:
- The mushrooms were sliced into bite-sized pieces.
- The kale was tightly rolled/packed and sliver cut because this yields ribbons, and I was hoping to have harmony with the noodles
- Broccoli was trimmed of woody/tough stems
- Shrimps were gently rinsed once and a half of a fresh lime was juiced on them. The lime peel was left in the shrimp to be put into soup together.
Make sure to make yourself a mixed drink with the leftover half lime.
I brought the broth over 180 F and kept heating on high. Prob around 190-200 F, the vegetables, then mushrooms were added. Once bubbles starting reaching the surface, the shrimp were added and the heat turned off.
I waited several minutes until the shrimp were white and curled.
Then, boiled the water for noodles, let them soak until soft, and strained.
The soup was finished!!! Finally, after about 1/4 of a day I had nearly 2 gallons of Pho!! What a wonderful thing :)
This is by far the best water on the block :D
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Hi, looks wonderful. Are u a full-time vegan?
hi @celestialcow, no my partner and I are not full time vegans, though we do eat a majority plant-based foods. This was an intentional decision for many reasons including health and ethics. We do love cheese, milk, and egg products, but recently since our first child came I cannot have dairy, eggs, soy, or legumes because it passes through the breastmilk and gives the baby a reaction.
thanks for ur honest reply. yes products like eggs and cheese are very addictive. for the ethics side they need to be sourced responsibility but even so even organic isnt cruelty free, just costs more. i guess such products such as milk and cheese arent meant for humans hence the reaction to baby, baby needs mothers milk not cows milk. weird about legumes, is that even for organic legume? is that the same for pulses aswell? soy tends to be GM and isnt so good for humans either.
huh, never tried Pho before. That sounds tasty AF
try anything once!
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What is the shrimp? It looks delicious!
Thank you! it was certainly a labor of love to create! The shrimp were fresh Gulf of Mexico shrimp!