I love soup, and bread…I’ll be the first to admit, the
second the weather gets cooler in the waning summer days, I cannot wait to pull
out my dutch oven and begin experimenting with new soup recipes or old favorite
ones. But it is March now, and the cold weather has been brutal this year with
a thaw few and far between. I have made a lot of soup, I am tired of making
soup, I’d like to eat a fresh salad, roast some new potatoes or find my grill
under the snow.
That said, this post is still about soup. The kids have been
sick, and their little tummies are still unstable after the evil stomach bug
entered our house a week ago. I know many people out there have encountered
this vicious strain, and all are struggling to pull themselves back together
after it passes. In order to get them back to full strength, I have been trying
to make some easy meals that tempt them, yet are not too heavy. Chicken soup is
a staple, an easy fall back. But, there is nothing I dread more than opening a
can of chicken soup, the look of the congealed fat floating on the top, and the
wimpy noodles disgust me. If you are lucky you might find a random piece of
chicken floating in the mess.
Homemade chicken soup is easy, and tastes so much better. I
have never followed a recipe for making chicken soup, and I can’t say that it
turns out the same every time. It depends on what I have available at the time,
and what I am in the mood for. Sometimes
I have leftover chicken from a previous meal, but mostly I poach whatever
chicken I have to use for the soup, it keeps it moist. This week, I needed an
Asian flair to my soup, my stomach was fine, and I wanted to have a little zip
for me, but still interest the minions. Miso was the way to go, and here is how
it came together. There is no added salt to this soup, the miso itself is
salty. (note, this is the basic recipe I use when I do not have miso in the house, so you can easily omit it, but it is really good)
olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
3 carrots, peeled and chopped
3 stalks celery, minced
1 yellow sweet pepper, chopped
8-10 cups low sodium or homemade chicken broth (start with
8, if you need more broth towards the end, add the extra)
1 can beans, drained and rinsed (white, garbanzo, black,
whatever you have)
½ cup miso paste
3 cups cooked chicken, chopped
3 large handfuls frozen spinach
2 handfuls wide egg noodles
Start by heating the olive oil in your dutch oven over
medium heat. Add the onion, carrots, celery and sweet pepper. Sauté for 5-8
minutes or until they start to soften up, dump in the chicken broth. Bring to a
boil over high heat, then reduce to low, cover and simmer for 15 minutes.
Return the heat to medium, add the beans, chicken and miso
to the soup and stir until all the miso is dissolved. Add the spinach and egg
noodles to the soup, cover once again and cook until the noodles are done. Stir
well and adjust seasonings, it may need some ground black pepper, but don’t add
any salt until you taste it.
If have other random vegetables laying around that sound
good, add them. I frequently clean out the fridge to use up this and that in my
soup, but this is the basic combination.
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