Pho Oregon

After a rough night at the touche post-cocktail shift, I awaken on the couch of my dear friends' house.
crap.
My head feels no bueno and i quickly run through the grocery list of liquid imbibes i managed to power through last night. Broyles, Chef, and Nate are already up and soaking the last few bits of sun our summer has offered to us. I greet everyone with an instinctive utter:

let's get pho

While I am well versed in the world of pho, I had yet to try their family favorite, Pho Oregon. Today was that day.

Once seated, they were greeted with a familiarity only the most regulars of regulars get. I take one glance at the menu and order what I always order, everything. Beef tripe, soft tendon, flank steak, and brisket in a soft anisey warm broth with a few scant bits of green onion and cilantro floating off to the side. Let's get pho'ked up.

When we get our respective bowls conversation ceases. i load up mine with handfuls of thai basil, jalepeno, and a tiny squeeze of lime. The table becomes silent and we speak in slurps, gulps, and smacks all the while in between dabs of our eyes and noses. You know you're doing something right when your eyes are tearing up and your nose is running like a faucet. awesome.

There's really no way to look pretty eating pho. Noises are made, and your face leaks as you try to suck up the rice noodles. I am often hunched over my bowl sloppily dipping my various beef parts in hoisin sauce and siracha and thanking whatever higher being led me to the destiny that is pho. Eating like a caveman pisses me of, but sometimes there really is no other way. Most people do. Broyles, however, like the dancer she be ate with an amazing elegance. back straight, chin up and only the tinisest of slurp. i was amazed, and amused. not once did she need a napkin. juxtapose that with me crying directly into my broth with a pile of haphazard and unloved napkins. i laughed a little on the inside.

never have i finished an entire bowl of pho, but i came close. Eating pho has a heirarchy to it. you go in knowing you'll have to make sacrifices. i usually abandon the noodles first, wasted space. then i give up on the tendon, and then the steak. i covet the sinuous chewy rubbery tripe and the therapeutic hug that is the broth. glorious.

Pho Hung(where i am a devotee, both beaverton and portland) has a sweeter broth, i like both, but Pho Oregon is deep NE. Definitely, if i pass out at the supper club house again.