[Magdalen] WTPho?

[Jay Weigel]

There's a Vietnamese place here called Vietopia. It has absolutely NO
atmosphere but whenever I go there it seems to be full of homesick
southeast Asian students from JMU, which I take as a good advertisement.
Their banh mi, which initially attracted me to the place, are good, but the
pho is spectacular. However, the special noodle soups are most amazing. The
only way to keep track of what's going to be on special is, apparently,
either to stop by (and it's in a part of town where I don't often go) or
call in, which might get the phone answer in an accent which is near
unintelligible. Any time I can catch the duck noodle soup I'm in heaven.....

There are 3 Thai restaurants in town that I know of. One is next door to
the place where I get my pedicures. It's okay but nothing to write home
about. Another is on the more south end of town, in front of what we call
the "Hispasian" grocery, and is good but I wasn't all that impressed when
we went there with friends. Oddly, there were *no* condiments on the
tables. None. Our favorite is a small, out-of-the-way family-run place on a
side street that has apparently been around for quite awhile. Mom and
Auntie man the kitchen, son and daughter-in-law wait tables, and the Little
Princess (granddaughter) hangs out behind the takeout counter, where she
has a desk and a TV and when she was younger had a pallet and sleeping bag.
The food is whatever the Thai equivalent is of "heimish" and plentiful, you
can get it spiced to your liking, and the clientele is obviously repeat,
many of them Thai and other Southeast Asians. If you go in to order takeout
(rather than phone in), you can sit down and Mom will see that you get a
cup of tea.

On Thu, Apr 7, 2016 at 12:30 PM, ME Michaud <michaudme at gmail.com> wrote:

> I've been learning how to make Pho. Have used the oven, a crock pot, and
> (while in Florida) got good results with a pressure cooker. I was fortunate
> enough to track down a halal butcher who stocked beef bones for the broth
> base because, while bones are easy to get here, Florida is all about
> prepared frozen foods.
>
> Read someplace that pho is the Vietnamese spelling of the French feu (as in
> Pot au feu), which was helpful info to me. It certainly makes sense. The
> French influence on Vietnamese cooking is undeniable.
>
> Anyway, I make up the broth, strain & freeze it in sixteen-ounce Ball jars.
> Easy enough to reheat it, add a few salad bar vegetables and some noodles,
> and slurp it down. Very healthy, fairly low fat, and requires little salt
> because of the sugar, vinegar and chiles.
> -M
>
> On Thursday, April 7, 2016, Marilyn Cepeda <mcepeda514 at gmail.com
> <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','mcepeda514 at gmail.com');>> wrote:
>
> > We love spicy foods. Our pho is Vietnamese. I make it at home often.
> >
> >
>