Turkey Pho From Thanksgiving Leftovers

Ingredients:

• Turkey Carcass Bones (I'm using two leg bones)
• 4 cups Chicken Broth
• 6 cups water
• 1 Yellow Onion
• 1 Ginger Root
• 4 Cloves
• 1 Cinnamon Stick
• 1 Licorice Root
• 1 tbsp Kosher Salt
• 4-6 tbsp Fish Sauce
• 1 tbsp Rock Sugar
• Pho Noodles
• Turkey Meat
• Cilantro
• Green Onion
• Thai Basil
• Lime Juice
• Sriracha
• Hoisin Sauce

Preparation:

I’m placing the leg bones in a big pot along with 4 cups of chicken broth, 6 cups of water, and then bringing it to a boil. Now In the meantime, I’m going to toast my spices. I’m using a whole yellow onion and a whole ginger. It’s about 6-8 inches long and then I’m just charring it over the stove flame. I’m being really careful while I’m doing this because I don’t want to burn the house down. I like to use a wire rack and just place it on top of the burner to give it a flat surface. If you don’t have a gas burner, you can just put it in your oven on broil and just cook it until you have a nice and blackened exterior. I’m charring the onion and ginger because it’ll help give the broth a round and complex flavor. Once that’s done I’m just going to drop it into the pot of broth. Normally in beef pho broth you’ll find spices like star anise, cardamom, fennel, etc. but my mom taught me that chicken pho has a cleaner flavor and doesn’t require all of those spices. So since we’re doing turkey pho i’m going to go with the poultry route and we’re going to keep it simple today. I’m using 4 pieces of cloves, 1 cinnamon stick, and 1 small piece of licorice, two inches long. This can be found at any Asian market. And sometimes it comes in a packet that looks like wood chips. You can use those too and maybe use just one or two pieces. I’ll drop all of those spices into the water, along with 1 tbsp of kosher salt and 1-2 tbsp of fish sauce, depending on how salty you like it, and 1 tbsp of rock sugar. I’m letting the broth simmer on medium heat for 30 minutes before removing the cinnamon stick and licorice. Letting them sit too long in the broth is going to have this overpowering cinnamon and licorice flavor and you don’t want that. I’ll turn the heat down to low and let the broth simmer for another 2 hours to let the flavors develop further. Feel free to let it simmer up to 4 hours but I think it tastes pretty good after 2. I’ll give it a taste and add in 2-3 tbsp of fish sauce if necessary. Now I’ll get the rest of the Pho ingredients ready to serve. I’ll cook the pho noodles according to the package and directions and serve it in a bowl. Then I’m topping the noodles with some pieces of turkey. I love dark meat but you should save some turkey breast from the night before too. Next, I’ll layer in some thin slices of white onions and a sprinkle of chopped cilantro and green onions. Then I’ll pour in my broth. Finally I’ll top it with some thai basil, bean sprouts, maybe a squeeze of lime, siracha and hoison sauce. This is how I do it. Everyone has their own way but feel free to adjust the condiments however you’d like. And there we have it, a new way to reinvent leftover turkey! You can use chicken for this as well to make Chicken Pho or Pho Ga. It’ll be delicious as well. Thanks for watching. Don’t forget to share this recipe with your friends and family!