F-O. F-Uh. F-uoh. It took a while to get down the actual Vietnamese pronunciation of Pho, but thankfully I did because I want to order it from every street vendor I see. Unfortunately, actually pronouncing Pho isn’t so easy and we spent one evening at the reception desk of our hotel repeating the name of the dish over and over again providing an absolute endless amount of laughter for the staff.
Vietnam wasn’t my first introduction to Pho. Back in DC, a coworker convinced us to go to a ‘hole-in-the-wall’ Vietnamese restaurant one day for lunch. Hesitant, but willing to try something new, I dove right into my rice noodle and meat soup and from that day forward I was hooked. Fortunately my chop stick skills have greatly improved since then and I can now eat Pho with chopsticks without splashing it all over myself in the process. Eating noodle soup with chopsticks, now that’s a serious life skill.
Noodles in Asia are served slightly differently than in the West, they’re usually served in broth. Pho is a bowl of rice noodles in broth that’s usually served with meat, bean sprouts, chilies, basil, and sometimes peanuts. Until we got to Vietnam I had actually never seen it prepared, so when the Pho vendor placed thinly pounded raw beef on the bed of noodles I had to cringe. Seconds late the beef cooked before my eyes as he poured in boiling hot broth.
Without realizing I was sitting next to a novice, I dug right into my Pho. Following my lead, Danny started in on his bowl and after a few bites pronounced it delicious. A few days later, midway through another bowl of Pho, Danny randomly decided that he actually liked using chopsticks for noodles…the next thing I knew we were shopping for a set of chopsticks. Maybe they’ll never be used to eat some Pho, but there’s always hoping!
Believe it or not, I just read not long ago that “Pho” is a transliteration into Vietnamese of the French word for noodles, and should be pronounced approximately the same way…
@Mark- Really? Love this factoid. Fascinating, Vietnamese imitating the French word for their own dish.
@Gillian- It is sort of like comfort food isn’t it?
I love Pho! I had never tried it before being in Vietnam but now we go for Pho every couple of weeks!!
My memory was slightly off. The theory I had read was that the word comes from the French pot-au-feu, a dish in which charred onions are added to broth, just as in the case of pho. The source of that information was originally an article in the Atlantic Monthly that I seem unable to locate right now, but I wiki’ed pho and reconstituted the tidbit. Wikipedia also presents linguistic theories that suggest a more regional derivation, from Chinese.
I think these are probably equally likely, since both countries had extensive involvement in Vietnam, and both were equally hated…
What about “F Fi PHO Fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman;”
maybe somehow connected to that childhood story. I don’t really think so, but speaking of blood lines, do you have any recollection of where Grandpa Don’s Birth Certificate is? Aunt Laurie says it was in a large white envelope & thinks you had it last. I’ve been trying to track down our ancestors through ancestry.com, but that document is a key that is required.
Love, Aunt Pam
YUM! There’s a great little place locally that has the most delicious, fragrant pho… mmmm.
Nooo… Pho! we miss Vietnam a lot and especially its food! … enjoy it! Please try these delicious drinks “Rau Ma” and “Sinh To Bo”!
Jesica and Gustavo
@Jessica & Gustavo- Hmmm… we loved vietnamese food as well, but we miss wine from mendoza more! 馃檪
I love pho, my favorite vietnamese food…..the photo looks really good.
Sounds superyummie. No idea where I can get it in Belgium though.
Will have to do some research!