It is. You can get them in the Tenderloin (heavily Vietnamese neighborhood) here. I think it was a street food that developed during the French occupation there. Or at least, that's what I surmise from the baguette.

Vietnamese is a cross between classic French and Southeast Asian. You get beef soups infused with Asian herbs and French spices. Interesting melding of cuisines.

That said, I've had pho a few times, and I've never liked it.

What's the difference between an herb and a spice?

Strike whatever I put here. I was wrong.

Mmmm, pho.

Spices are nuts, berries, bark, and stamen.

Ginger and turmeric I believe are spices, and they're roots (rather, rhizomes).

General rule of thumb is that leaves are herbs and seeds are spices, and that while you don't necessarily have to grind herbs to release their essential oils, you generally need to grind spices. There are exceptions, of course.

Spices...I don't remember well enough to venture.

Do spices come from seeds?

x-posty

Mmmmm.... eleven herbs and spices....

Hivemind question:

It looks like that messages I send using gmail aren't looking the way I expect them to on the other end--that the blank lines between paragraphs are disappearing, making my longer messages difficult to read. Is there any fix for this besides entering an extra carriage return, which I assume would make my messages look over-spaced to anyone receiving them through gmail? I'm trying to make it my primary account, but I'm sure not going to use it for job searching or contact with editors and agents if I'm not sure it's looking polished and professional in the recipient's inbox.

I snerk at Hec's favorite sandwiches. Bob Bob similarly categorizes experiences. He loves rankings. He asks me questions like, "where have you had the best pancakes in your life?" when I can't even remember the last time I had pancakes. In his case, I think it's related to an omnivorous hunger to KNOW, this categorizing. He has to be able to slot knowledge, to rate it, to put it into place. Like how he came in here and knew the thumbnail sketch of that philosopher, including the books where he was cited? He could also name the top five philosophers in that field and their departments and then name the top philosopher in that department and what they're most famous for.

Not surprisingly, he likes baseball.

Huh. So I flipped on ABC before Lost starts, and apparently Freddie Prinze Jr. and David Silver (from 90210, whatever the actor's name is) are in a show together.

Weird.