Feu or pho? The French dish that probably inspired the Vietnamese classic

The dish: Pot-au-feu, France

Pot-au-feu is a simple French dish of meat and vegetables.Credit: Getty Images

Plate up Let’s jump straight to an interesting point: pot-au-feu might sound oddly familiar. That’s because “feu” sounds very similar to the famous Vietnamese noodle soup, pho (pronounced “f-uh”). And indeed, there is a link: there’s a theory that pot-au-feu, a traditional soup cooked by Vietnam’s colonial occupiers, was the inspiration for pho.

And it’s easy to see a certain similarity. Pot-au-feu is a French classic, a one-pot wonder, a dish of meat – several cuts and types including beef shin and entrecote, duck and sausage – simmered over many hours with various vegetables and a bouquet garni of herbs. To serve, the broth is dished up, sometimes studded with croutons or pasta, and then the meat and vegetables make up the second course. This main dish is usually paired with condiments such as horseradish sauce, mustard, cornichons and hard-boiled egg mayonnaise. You’ll find this in almost every home kitchen across France.

First serve Humans have been boiling meat and vegetables for some time – there’s evidence the Romans had a dish similar to pot-au-feu. The French version we know is likely to have been developed over many centuries. Regardless, the first reference to pot-au-feu itself was in the 1651 cookbook Le Cuisinier Francois. Back then, the dish, as per its direct translation, was a pot on the fire, a perpetual stew in which cheap, readily available cuts of meat were tossed into the broth with root vegetables each day. This was food of the poor originally, and it was popular across the country.

Order there In Paris, go to a specialist: Le Roi du Pot au Feu (the king of pot-au-feu) does what it says on the box, serving classic pot-au-feu in two courses (no website).

Order here In Australia, pot-au-feu is served as a winter specialty by plenty of French restaurants. In Sydney, try Monopole (bentleyrestaurantgroup.com.au) or Brasserie L’Entrecote (brasserielentrecote.com.au), while in Melbourne, France Soir (france-soir.com.au) is a good bet.

Cook it Make it yourself following Karen Martini’s spring chicken pot-au-feu recipe at Good Food.

One more thing Most well-known chefs in France have their own distinctive combination of meats for pot-au-feu. Alain Ducasse uses only beef. Auguste Escoffier recommends beef, and the necks, wings and gizzards of unspecified fowl, while Joel Robuchon opts for beef, veal, chicken and duck. Paul Bocuse is a beef, veal and chicken man.