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Bar Pho brings 'phumplings' to the inaugural Lunar Markets

Mary Ward

Bar Pho's phumplings are so much in demand they sold out every night at the Sydney Festival.
Bar Pho's phumplings are so much in demand they sold out every night at the Sydney Festival.Cole Bennetts

Sometimes you have an idea so good, you simply have to file an intellectual property application right then and there.

When pho queen Tina Do and her partner Neils Pantenburg found out their Vietnamese street food stall Bar Pho had been picked up for last month's Sydney Festival, they knew they would need to do something special.

The duo, who have been at Bondi Markets since March 2013, explored various options; "pho cigars" – spring rolls filled with pho – among the most zany. But they kept coming back to one key question: What is a comfort food, other than pho, that people in Sydney love?

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The answer? Dumplings.

It only took the pair 15 minutes to send off an application to trademark their new dish: "phumplings".

As the name suggests, phumplings are pho dumplings. Their filling is made from grassfed beef mince (from the Riverina, no less) and pho greens (a mixture of coriander, onion, shallot and basil; the same as you would find on top of any good bowl of pho).

Tina Do with her phumpling innovation that is creating a sensation.
Tina Do with her phumpling innovation that is creating a sensation.Cole Bennetts

The phumplings themselves, xiao long baos, are made from natural gelatine of pork skin mixed with pork mince. There is also a pho jelly (made from Bar Pho's 18-hour stock) inside each phumpling, which provides a burst of pho soup flavour once you bite in.

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The phumplings are served in pho soup and finished off with dots of hoisin sauce, fresh basil, lime and, if you're feeling brave, Bar Pho's super hot Mumma's Chilli.

When they made their debut at Bar Pho's Sydney Festival stall last month, the phumplings sold out every night.

"We could not make enough of it," Do says.

"We started at 5.30pm and most nights were sold out by 7pm."

Luckily, Do has sourced some extra kitchen capacity to bring her phumplings to the inaugural Lunar Markets, held at The Star from February 12-22.

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The Lunar Markets will celebrate Chinese New Year with a host of stalls from Asian favourites such as Bao Stop, Daniel San and Fat Noodle, as well as lion dancers and music.

In addition to the Lunar Markets, Bar Pho's traditional (the stall is proudly MSG-free) fare can be found every Saturday at both Bondi and Eveleigh markets. Although a Surry Hills pop-up in June last year fuelled speculation that a restaurant was on the cards, Do says there was one thing stopping her from setting up a permanent shop.

"My mother insisted it was bad luck to open in my Chinese sign, which was the Year of the Horse in 2014."

But with the Lunar Markets coinciding with the start of the Year of the Ram, Do is finally ready for a restaurant.

"Bar Pho shall open a permanent space in 2015," she says.

"We people in Sydney to come to Bar Pho for breakfast or brunch or lunch, [and] have a bowl of pho like they do in Vietnam for breakfast instead of bacon and eggs."

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