Eating PHO for the first time

I had lunch with a friend today and we decided it was cold enough to go and eat PHO, a Vietnamese dish. 

This was my first time and it was quite an "adventure" because we did not know HOW to eat this.  

Pho is a rich broth with rice noodles and a few vegetables. You order it with your choice of meat. I had raw beef, and brisket. My friend had the same with tendon.

On the side there is a plate of bean sprouts, Thai basil, pepper slices and lime wedges. Hoisin sauce and siracha sauce on little plates.
Thai basil, we discovered, has a licorice/anise flavor.








Our bowls were fragrant and hot.
We tackled it with the spoon and the chop sticks provided. Fortunately we also had forks. Lol.

The chop sticks are for the noodles and meat and the spoon is for the broth. It was not easy. You mix some basil and bean sprouts on top of the broth, sprinkle on some lime juice and then use the spoon, and in our case, the fork, to create a perfect bite dipped in the sauce.  We had many bites that were not so perfect but delicious nonetheless! 

We didn't use much sauce and the tendon in my friend's bowl was left behind but we did okay! 

Our leftovers!


So much food!


We were not at all sure if we did it correctly but a you tube video that
I watched afterwards reassured me that we did not commit etiquette suicide.  Noise and slurping are allowed!