PHO

I love pho. I tried to get the O with the squiggly line above it but that was impossible to figure out. But anyway, I'm deep on the pho train right now and I'm not getting off any time soon.

Currently, I crave pho more than ramen or any other soup noodle. How is that possible? Well, I've had ramen my whole my life, being half Japanese and all. But pho, not so much. I think it might be my palette's changing - I'm enjoying more of a simple taste... turning into an old man (but far from cranky).

Pho's got a real nice, light taste to it with a real freshness too, you know, with a handful of basil and bean sprouts - that whole deal. I think subtle flavors get overlooked a lot these days, especially in the U.S of A. where more is better and covered in cheese with deep fried everything.

I like the customize my broth as I go. A little hoisin sauce here, a little chili sauce there. Then as bowl starts to empty I'll re-think what it needs. Maybe more noodles.

Oh, the one in the photo above is simply pho with chicken. It came with a nice little dish of ginger dipping sauce for the lean white meat, which was just fucking perfect. After I put the basil and sprouts in, I had to stop and take a photo. What a gorgeous bowl of food (and there's so many food blogs around lately, I try to sneak a photo without being seen these days... people even taking pictures of Big Macs and shit, posting it on instagram - nobody needs to see that!).

Reminds me of Hawaiian style Oxtail soup that always comes with a small dish of grated ginger sauce to dip.

And there's gotta be at LEAST a dozen pho spots around Long Beach. There's 3 spots within a half-mile from my pad. There's 2 near my work, too.

I've had pho more times than I could count, sure, but right now it's my go-to. Anytime for me.
 
note: it's more commonly pronounced as "fuh". Less commonly as "foe".