Only freedom will do

edinburgher

I've just told Mr Goldie that one of the people that live in my computer has just described me as balanced and respectable. I did NOT appreciate the hysterical laughter that followed this statement!

Well, as long as someone was amused!

I'll send Mr MWC's pho recipe later - it was delicious but if I remember correctly had rather a lot of shin of beef and fillet steak in

See, I knew one of you lovely people would have made it before :T

I used 550g of oxtail and about the same of marrowbones. The mouthfeel was nice (could detect the edge of a nice gelatine-y base), but it was way too watery. With hindsight, there's no meat on marrowbones, so I probably used about half as much as I should have done (although it was no doubt full of vitamins, like all bone broths). Next time I'd probably use more like a kilo of oxtail *and* the marrowbones. Basically whatever I can find in Mr M will go in

I would also consider adding some steak for the 'real' meat in the bowl, but I'm not made of money. I used the oxtail meat, but maybe it gets 'washed out' after such long cooking? Kilo of oxtail + bones would be c. £6 for the broth alone, maybe I shold just accept that it's not a particularly economical dish?

Accompaniments were nice. We had rice noodles, beansprouts, beef, shitaake mushrooms, lime, basil, coriander, green and red chillies and sriracha (might have spelled that wrong).

Should probably stop talking about it now, but it has grabbed my imagination. Not since the 'butter noodles' phase have I had so much fun preparing little bowls of ingredients :rotfl:

muddywhitechicken

Mr MWC used Mr Stein's recipe with the following tweak: when he strained the broth he shredded the shin of beef and added it back in.

As stocks/soups/stews always taste better the next day, Mr MWC chilled the broth overnight.

We found that the recipe made more than enough broth/shredded beef for 5 adults so we froze some for another day

MWCx

muddywhitechicken

Bun cha was my favourite dish in Vietnam



I shall now nag Mr MWC until he makes it for me

edinburgher

Looks lovely! Thanks so much for the recipe, explains why mine was a bit flat, he used double the ingredients :eek:

Wonder where I can get relatively cheap beef... Chinese supermarket mebbe?

Greying_Pilgrim

edinburgher wrote: »

Mrs E has suggested the cracking idea of a recipe diary to help me improve dishes that are keepers, but need tweaked

Heartily concur with the wonderful Mrs E! It is the best way to get some super recipes that you can tweak to suit your palate or your wallet Ed - the recipe cards in my index are mostly *based* on some recipe off the internet or out of a cookery book that I found, but there is usually something that I do differently - eg method wise or add in/leave out ingredients.

Bit surprised that Pho wouldn't be an economical dish? But then what do I know as a veggie???? :think: I remember watching Reza Mohammed's series on Vietnam and he kind of implied that it was an 'everyman' dish - maybe I understood wrong, or price differentials are such in different parts of the world. Hope you get to make it again though Ed

Greying x

edinburgher

I suspect that the meat in other parts of the world is raised to even worse standards than that we buy in the UK

A veggie probably has some fantastic pho options, shiitake mushroom and ginger broth sounds wonderful and you can get huge bags of dried mushrooms from Chinese supermarkets.

Greying_Pilgrim

edinburgher wrote: »

I suspect that the meat in other parts of the world is raised to even worse standards than that we buy in the UK

Oh, I concur - I guess I just thought that it was made with the more 'economical' meat parts that required long, slow cooking.

MWC and I were mentioning Vegetarian Pho t'other day

Greying x

edinburgher

Think I'll try that next, payday trip to giant Chinese supermarket in a fortnight

gallygirl

edinburgher wrote: »

Wonder where I can get relatively cheap beef... Chinese supermarket mebbe?

Field
Cow
Sharp knife

AlexLK

edinburgher wrote: »

As someone who went to university twice (just glad the second course was only a year long), I'd think very carefully before jumping back in to anything bar vocational training :eek:

:rotfl: I do it as something to keep my mind occupied, plus an expensive certificate is still motivating even at my age.

edinburgher wrote: »

I suspect that the meat in other parts of the world is raised to even worse standards than that we buy in the UK

A veggie probably has some fantastic pho options, shiitake mushroom and ginger broth sounds wonderful and you can get huge bags of dried mushrooms from Chinese supermarkets.

I really like the idea of keeping a recipe diary, if you do this, please share it on here for us mere mortals that cannot be inventive with food.

As for the meat, there is no need to buy meat that has been raised in awful conditions. Most farmers care a great deal about their livestock and usually buying your meat from a reputable butcher or farm shop will ensure quality produce. If you are concerned about where your meat is coming from, visit your local farm shop and ask for a tour around the farm; a farmer who refuses to show you around is likely one that has little pride in his land and livestock. I appreciate supermarket meat is cheaper but it's so cheap because animals have often been "factory farmed" and supermarkets are often not giving a fair deal to farmers either.