Pho perfected by patience

WAITE PARK – It takes the Viet-Tien International Market & Deli two days to make the broth for its pho (pronounced fuh) soup.

And during a typical winter week, it only takes two days for the Vietnamese restaurant at 311 Third St. NE to run out of its 100-quart stock.

"We sell double the amount in the winter," said Viet-Tien manager Kim Nguyen, an Apollo High School graduate. "But all year long it's one of our biggest sellers."

While beef pastes and powders have been developed to speed up the labor intensive pho-making process, the restaurant refuses to change the South Vietnamese from-scratch recipe.

The Viet-Tien pho broth is made from beef bones and seasoned with anise star, cinnamon sticks, coriander and fennel seeds.

"Nothing is as good as homemade," Nguyen said. "My uncle, who created this recipe, says there can be no shortcuts."

And the broth is so popular that one regular customer requests a straw to finish it.

"Pho is always our favorite dish," said St. Cloud State Vietnamese Student Association president Duyen Nguyen, who is not directly related to Kim's family. "I think it is the combination of spices. You get so many flavors."

It's a similar story for the White Horse at 809 St. Germain St. in downtown St. Cloud, which makes its pho over the span of three days using products from Viet-Tien's market.

"We don't use any shortcuts," White Horse head chef Tommy Lee said in a September interview. "It's worth it, though."

China Restaurant at 3520 Division St. W in St. Cloud also serves pho — marked by a neon pho sign — but declined to be part of this story.

"Pho has really become more popular since (Viet-Tien) opened in 2003," Kim said. "At first we made it in a small pot. Then we had to go a bigger one. Now we use the biggest pot we can find. But I'm not complaining."

Viet-Tien's pho is made the same way it was in Kim's hometown — a small South Vietnamese village called Nhon My — using egg noodles and topped with bean sprouts, basil, jalapeno and lime juice.

The pho is offered with a variety of protein options including sliced eye of round steak, meatballs, seafood, beef tendon and beef tripe (part of the cow's stomach).

Tendon and tripe options are the most authentic, but the sliced eye of round steak is the most popular.

The thin steaks strips are put into soup bowls raw and cooked immediately by the boiling broth.

"It creates a totally different taste if you cook it before," Kim explains.

Kim said her family immigrated to the United States in 1994 at a time when Nhon My residents had to collect their water from the nearby Song Kon River and children only went to school for half a day so they could work in fields afterward.

She visited Vietnam in 2010 with her husband Quoc Le, Viet-Tien's head baker. Nhon My now has running water.

But the pho is made the same way.

Kim also traveled to the northern part of the country and sampled pho in Vietnam's capital, Hanoi.

"The northern style is very different in the north from the south," Kim said. "The pho from Hanoi, they don't want any extra stuff in it. They just want to taste the broth, the meat and the noodle."

Viet-Tien's southern style has developed a Central Minnesota following.

And despite the high demand, don't expect them to take any shortcuts.

"We have people tell us to open up in the Twin Cities," Kim said. "We have loyal customers from the Cities who stop every time they pass through. They eat one and then order another to go."

Follow Jake Laxen on Twitter @jacoblaxen.

About this issue

This is the D'lish soup issue that looks at the winter warmer staple that has variations in every food culture.

Past D'lish soup profiles include how restaurants pick the soup of the day, how Good Earth's soups have prompted expansion for the co-op and recipe of the week entries for Texas-style chili and Carolina she-crab soup.