On the heat. Mild · heat at the table

Ingredients

• 2 kg lamb marrow and neck bones
• 300 g lamb stir-fry strips, sliced very thin
• 2 onions and 8 cm ginger, halved and charred black
• — TOASTED WHOLE SPICES
• 2 cinnamon sticks · 4 star anise
• 6 cloves · 1 tbsp coriander seed · 1 tsp fennel
• 1 black cardamom
• — THE BOWL
• Flat rice noodles · fish sauce · rock sugar · salt
• Thai basil, coriander, bean sprouts, lime, chilli, hoisin, sriracha

Method

1. Blanch the bones 10 minutes, drain, and rinse each one under the tap. This is what makes the broth clear.
2. Char the onion and ginger halves directly over a flame or under a grill until genuinely blackened on the cut faces. Toast the whole spices in a dry pan.
3. Everything into 4 litres of cold water. Bring up very slowly — never let it boil — and hold at the barest tremble for 5 hours, skimming often.
4. Strain through muslin. Season with fish sauce, rock sugar and salt until it is slightly stronger than you want, because the noodles will dilute it.
5. Noodles cooked and divided into bowls. Raw lamb slices laid on top.
6. Pour the boiling broth over — it cooks the lamb in the bowl in about 20 seconds. Herbs, sprouts, lime and chilli at the table.

Cook's note. Never boil a pho broth. A rolling boil emulsifies the fat into the liquid and turns it cloudy and greasy, and there is no way back from it.

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