Home style noodle soup for entertaining

A few nights ago, we were invited to a birthday party. The dinner consisted of noodle soup of two different kind, pho with rice noodle and rice noodle with green curry. Condiments include corn, chopped basil and green onion, stir fry squash, bean sprout. To spice it up, one could use chilli soy sauce and chilli paste.

Noodle soup broth was heated up on a small portable gas stove. Broth was rich with cinnamon, hint of ginger and beef stock. We started with rice noodle, condiments and then laddled up broth on our bowl. After a few spoonful of chilli paste, this is how it looked like.

The green curry was pretty mild. Sweet with a bit hint of beef flavor. Suitable for kids. Same thing with pho, stack up your rice noodle, top of with choice of condiments, laddle up the curry and spice it up to your liking. Yum...

It was a simple yet satisfying dinner for us. Not overly filling but then it's not a problem because the birthday cake was already waiting for us.

A few weeks ago, I was gifted with frozen oxtail. Not knowing what to do, I went to Epicurious and tried to find a recipe for it. An accidental recipe found turned out to be very good. That recipe I believe will be suitable if you want to try entertaining with noodle soup at home. An oxtail recipe with star anise from Epicurious could be the base for the pho broth. Just make adjustment to the amount of oxtail and soup amount and you're ready to start enjoying pho noodle soup at the comfort of your home.