[Charbar]

We will have left over chicken from my first ever whole chicken that I'm making this afternoon. So how do I make soup?

Anyone have any great soup recipes?

Thanks so much!!

[kaplods]

There are a lot of ways to make soup (and recipes online) but here is what I do. I have a quick easy way and a longer (not difficult way) when I have a whole chicken carcass left over. The nice thing about the easy way is you can make it even if you don't have a chicken carcass.

The quick way: pull off all of the usable meat on the carcass. Add it to canned chicken broth or water and bouillon cubes or broth base. (Or use the broth you make the long way - below) Put in chopped veggies you like (carrots, celery, and onion are the old standbys, but you can put in any veggies you like raw, canned, frozen, or leftover)
Season as you like (I throw in a bay leaf, garlic, cayenne, parsley - I often add in canned tomatoes or tomato paste if I'm adding tons of veggies, or I leave out the tomato products if I'm making chicken noodle). Cook until veggies are starting to get tender, add a few noodles (not alot or they'll absorb too much water and you won't have soup anymore) and cook until noodles are tender (total cooking time less than 15 minutes).

Pull of the largest chunks of meat off the carcass. Dice meat and refrigerate for later (so it doesn't dissolve into mush).

Crack the carcass in half or quarters and put itin a pot with a a quartered onion, a couple stalks of celery and a couple carrots, some garlic and a bay leaf if you have it. Throw in some dried minced garlic, garlic powder or garlic cloves. Add water or broth until it barely covers the carcass. Simmer for a couple hours. Let it cool for about 20 minutes. Strain the broth and pick off any additional meat you can from the carcass. Now follow the steps of the quick recipe.

[mandalinn82]

OK, here is my basic procedure:

pick most/all meat off bones of chicken - refrigerate. To a large pot, add the chicken bones/skin, 4 carrots (cut in large pieces), 4 ribs celery (large pieces), 2 yellow onions (large dice) and 5-6 cloves of garlic, smashed. Cover by about 2" with cold water, bring to a boil, and simmer. I usually also add 2-3 bay leaves and 2 sprigs fresh rosemary directly to the pot. Simmer covered for 2-3 hours.

Strain the broth, rinse out the pot, and return your homemade broth to your stockpot. Then, very important, allow to cool and refrigerate. Once cold, skim the fat off of the top of the pot to get rid of all the excess fat you can. Reheat and season to taste with salt, pepper, and my two secret ingredients - 1 tsp of chili powder and a few dashes of cayenne.

Once you have your broth, possibilities are endless. My favorite combinations - white beans and leftover chicken with diced celery and carrot, "mexican" with leftover chicken, black beans or a can of corn, a can of tomatoes, and brown rice, seasoned with extra cayenne/chili powder and served with sour cream on top. Cook some wild rice in the broth, add your chicken and cubed veggies (carrots, celery, onion, or whatever you'd like) and make your own chicken and rice soup. Or, use your picked off chicken meat for another purpose and make an easy soup of barley, chicken sausage, carrot, celery, and wilted arugula.

You can even use homemade chicken stock as a base for a pureed veggie soup. Cook leek and butternut squash cubes in your chicken broth, then puree - low calorie and so high in flavor. Roasted pumpkin works well in that too.

[Cheryl14]

Chicken soup is easy! Here's my MIL's recipe which I think is the yummiest I've ever had!

Fill a pot halfway with water and add about 8 boullion cubes (Chicken) Bring water to a boil and add cut-up celery, carrots, and onions. When the veggies are getting a bit soft, add your cooked chicken. Also add salt and pepper to taste as well as one teaspoon freshly-grated nutmeg or 1/2 teaspoon grated nutmeg from the spice shelf. Simmer soup about twenty more minutes. As this is simmering, boil water for your noodles. My MIL uses those cute bowtie noodles which make the soup look very professional, but you can use any noodles that you like. When the noodles are done, drain them. Rinse them off so they don't stick to one another. When you are ready for dinner, put the noodles in each bowl and then add your chicken soup mixture on top.

Even typing this is making me hungry for Chicken soup! Enjoy!

(If you have raw chicken, just add it first to a pot of water and start it cooking THEN add your vegetables, etc. It takes a bit longer this way but not by much. You can add chicken stock or water and boullion cubes, whichever you want.)

Cheryl

[midwife]

One thing I like to do is carmelize the veggies in a little bit of olive oil before adding the broth and the chicken to the pot.

Green chile is always a nice addition to any chicken soup!

And congrats on cooking a chicken!! Learning to cook was such an important step for me to get away from processed, high cal, unhealthy foods.

[kaplods]

I also saw a tv chef "roast" the carcass first "for flavor development" that I've always wanted to try. He cracked the carcass into four to six pieces and threw in the onion, celery, carrots onto the roasting pan and roasted it at 400 degrees until the veggies were soft with carmelized brown edges, and then threw that into the pot. He said he did the same with beef short ribs for beef soup.

[srmb60]

My secret is Knorr vegetable soup mix. Add anything and everything.

[Glory87]

Here is one of my favorite soup recipes (not chicken, but I hope you like it anyway):

Spinach Chickpea Leek Soup

This is SO good and so fast and easy to make - makes plenty for several days. Great to make on a Sunday and eat all week.

1 tbs olive oil
2 leeks, sliced thinly (circles)
1 zuchini, chopped
minced garlic (I use tons)
2 14 oz cans tomatoes
small can tomato paste
1 bay leaf
3 3/4 cup veg broth
1 14 oz can chickpeas (gabanzo beans) drained
block of frozen spinach (thawed, drained)
1 tbs oregano
1/2 tsp white pepper
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
fresh parm cheese for topping

Heat the oil in a large sauce pan, add leeks and zucchini and cook briskly for 5 minutes.

Add the garlic, tomatoes, tomato paste, bay leaf, vegetable broth, chickpeas and spices. Bring to a boil and simmer 5 minutes.

Shred the spinach finely, add to the soup and boil for 2 minutes. Season to taste. (the longer it cooks on the stove, the better it is). Remove the bay leaf, sprinkle with parmesan cheese (if desired).


The power of the internet puts literally thousands of healthy, easy to make soup recipes at your fingertips.

[Charbar]

Wow! These are all awesome! I can't wait to try them. I'm so excited this will be low sodium and extra tasty.. then any nasty canned soup.

Thanks. I'm book marking this pages b/c of all the ideas!

I can see myself buying a whole chicken everyweek now! yahooo!

[Ruthxxx]

I have a few tricks too after 50 years of soup making!

I throw in the onion skins to give a nice golden colour.

Garlic and sliced ginger give a nice oriental flavour.

When the stock is finished and the fat removed, I boil it down so I can freeze it in ice cube trays. Pop them out, store in a Ziplock bag and you will have instant bouillon cubes. Just add water. I boil the stock down until it's sort of syrupy.

You can saute stuff in chicken stock instead of oil. I use my cubes.

[bizlawchik]

Originally Posted by Ruthxxx

I throw in the onion skins to give a nice golden colour.

My grandmother's chicken soup was always orange. And I never would eat chicken soup anywhere else when I was little because it wasn't orange and that was the way I thought it was supposed to be. When I grew up and started to cook I found out that my grandmother added a couple of teaspoons of tomato paste to the soup. After many discussions with my sister and my cousins about this I asked my mom why. Like whether it made it taste any better or different. Turns out my grandmother just couldn't stand the thought of eating anything yellow so she added the tomato paste. Funny, huh? We were all thinking it was some great family secret.