Phở guide
Beef, chicken or vegan phở: which bowl should you choose?
Phở is Vietnamese rice noodle soup, and the topping changes the character of the bowl. Our current Menu offers six choices: four with beef, one with carefully poached chicken and one vegan option. This guide puts them side by side.
What is phở?
Phở emerged in northern Vietnam and developed regional styles as it travelled south. Beef phở, or phở bò, and chicken phở, phở gà, are two established branches. Our current range also includes Phở chay, bringing beef, chicken and vegan choices into one guide.
You will often see the name typed without its Vietnamese diacritics as “pho”. We use phở here and focus on the bowls actually served at Uncle Tư’s Kitchen, rather than treating the dish as one fixed formula.
What all six bowls have in common
Our Menu describes phở as a traditional Vietnamese rice noodle soup served with fresh bean sprouts, herbs, spring onion and white onion.
Begin with the four beef bowls
We use good-quality beef across four choices, but the difference is not simply the name. Rare Beef keeps the focus on rare beef. For Beef Brisket, we gently boil the brisket until it is tender, then cut it into thick slices so it stays juicy in the bowl.
Rare & Brisket brings Rare Beef and Beef Brisket together. Special Combination is the fullest mix, reflected in its Vietnamese description: Phở đặc biệt · bò tái, bò nạm & bò viên.
Four beef choices at a glance
Start with Rare Beef or Beef Brisket when you want one beef style. Choose Rare & Brisket for both, or Special Combination for the broader mix.
Chicken: one carefully poached choice
We carefully poach the chicken for Phở gà so it stays tender and juicy instead of drying out. It is the straightforward route when you prefer chicken to any of the four beef combinations.
There is one chicken entry in the current section, so the choice is straightforward: pick it when tender poached chicken is the texture you want in your bowl.
The chicken choice
Vegan phở: understand the two markers
Vegan Phở (Phở chay) is the only choice in the current phở section marked Vegan. It also carries the Gluten-free option marker.
Those markers answer different questions. Vegan describes the dish; Gluten-free option signals that an option may be available. Neither guarantees that a dish is free from allergens, so the kitchen-wide notice below still applies.
The vegan choice
For dietary needs, read the item markers together with the allergen notice rather than treating either label as a safety guarantee.
Which phở should you choose?
For one beef texture, compare Rare Beef with Beef Brisket. For contrast in one bowl, Rare & Brisket combines them; Special Combination is the broader combination described on its card. Poached Chicken is the clear non-beef route, while Vegan Phở is the only current bowl marked Vegan.
Before ordering
Please tell our team about any allergies or dietary requirements before ordering. Our kitchen handles allergens and cannot guarantee that any dish is free from traces.