Making pho at home
A home batch of phở stands on four measured things: a broth held at 85–95 °C for 6–12 hours with beef bones or 1.5–2 hours with chicken, onion and ginger charred at 240 °C, a spice bag weighed out per 4 litres, and noodles and beef cut to the right millimetres. This page gives each number in cooking order, from parboiling the bones to mixing nước chấm for the table.
| Item | Measurement |
|---|---|
| Phở rice noodles | 6–10 mm wide |
| Bún vermicelli | 1.5–2 mm wide |
| Fresh phở noodles | 10–20 s in boiling water |
| Beef for phở tái | 1–3 mm slices |
| Broth for pouring | 85–95 °C |
| Beef broth | 6–12 h at 85–95 °C |
| Chicken broth | 1.5–2 h at 85–95 °C |
| Bone parboil | 10–15 min, then rinse |
Beef broth simmers 6–12 hours at 85–95 °C; chicken broth needs only 1.5–2 hours at the same gentle heat.
Start every batch the same way: cover the bones with cold water, boil them for 10–15 minutes, then pour everything off and rinse the bones. This parboil strips scum and blood that would otherwise cloud the stock during the long simmer.
Return the clean bones to the pot and hold the liquid at a bare simmer of 85–95 °C. A rolling boil is the standard failure here — it agitates fat and protein into the liquid and turns the broth murky, and no amount of straining fully reverses it.
Time depends on the animal. Beef phở (phở bò) needs 6–12 hours at that temperature; chicken phở (phở gà) is done in 1.5–2 hours, so a chicken batch can start after lunch and still be ready for dinner.
The periods below are elapsed time within a single cooking session, not calendar dates.
The aromatics go in blackened: 20–30 minutes at 240 °C in the oven, or held directly over an open flame.
Halve the onion and cut the ginger into large pieces, then char them at 240 °C for 20–30 minutes until the surfaces are blackened. The same result comes from holding the pieces over an open flame, turning until the outside is charred.
The blackened onion and ginger enter the pot after the parboil stage, alongside the clean bones, so their char works through the whole simmer rather than sitting on top of a finished broth.
Skipping the char is a named failure: raw aromatics give a pale, flat broth. The 240 °C / 20–30 minute window is the measured fix, and it costs nothing but oven time while the parboiled bones are being rinsed.
For every 4 litres of broth: 4–6 star anise, one 7–8 cm cassia stick, 4–5 cloves, about 10 g of coriander seed and 2–3 cardamom pods.
The spice load scales with the liquid, not with the bones. Four litres is the reference volume, and every quantity below is stated against it; a 2-litre pot takes half, an 8-litre pot takes double.
Cloves are the failure point: doubling them pushes the broth toward a medicinal taste, so hold the line at 4–5 per 4 litres even if the pot smells mild in the first hour.
Keep the spices in a bag or sachet so they can be lifted out cleanly at the end of the simmer instead of being strained out with the bones.
| Item | Measurement | What it means in the pot |
|---|---|---|
| Phở rice noodles | 6–10 mm wide | The flat wide noodle the bowl is built on |
| Bún vermicelli | 1.5–2 mm wide | A much thinner noodle for other dishes, not phở |
| Fresh phở noodles | 10–20 s in boiling water | Longer boiling turns them gummy |
| Beef for phở tái | 1–3 mm slices | Thin enough to cook in the bowl |
| Broth for pouring | 85–95 °C | Sets 1–3 mm beef in 15–30 seconds |
| Beef broth | 6–12 h at 85–95 °C | A bare simmer, never a rolling boil |
| Chicken broth | 1.5–2 h at 85–95 °C | Same heat, far less time |
| Bone parboil | 10–15 min, then rinse | Strips scum and blood from the stock |
The reference basis is the site's own fact sheet on phở broth, noodles and fish sauce; no external publications are cited.