Healing Chicken Vegetable Soup

I bought some BBQ seasoned chicken leg quarters a while ago. Roasted them, then made bone broth, which is the darker jar shown in this photo. I had also made another batch of bone broth using plain chicken legs. Both of these jelled perfectly, indicating a lot of natural, healthy collagen. For this recipe, I used all the darker bone broth and about half of the lighter jar, so about 40oz. total.

For both of these bone broths, I just simmered the skin and bones with a splash of apple cider vinegar in a couple quarts of cold, filtered water. No additional spices, seasonings or other vegetables added. I might just keep it simple like this in the future. This way, with no onion or garlic, the bone broth is good for humans or my dog and cat. Roasted legs and thighs have made the best bone broths.

I chopped-sliced-cubed the vegetables and added them to the pot according to cooking time needed. The 3 carrots need the longest, so they went in with a couple tablespoons of Ghee and a tiny big of onion. I sauteed these a few minutes, then covered for a bit longer over low heat.

Then I added some bone broth, 8oz. of frozen green beans and the Yukon Gold potatoes, cubed. This was covered and simmered about 15 minutes. Then more bone broth and all the chopped garlic, onion, 2/3c cooking Sherry and 10oz. of roasted chicken. Cover this and simmer another 15 minutes.

This turned out really well, with no additional seasonings! Just plain, healing chicken and vegetable soup! . .Lin

Chicken-Rice Vegetable Soup

I'm on an extend stay currently in Arizona. But with foodies, this doesn't mean our desire to create in the kitchen disappears. Grocery shopping and cooking in a new place can be so fun, especially if you're privileged enough to find an ethnic, or really good Farm Market. . .Cook Where You've Landed, a bit like Bloom Where You're Planted. Have fun with it. Today, I'm making this soup for someone who has a really bad virus, and that would be me!

2-3T single source EVOO

3-4 stalks of celery

3 big carrots

1/2 lg. onion

1 lg. clove garlic

1/3 lg. red pepper

2-3 quarts of fresh cold water

1/3 lg. head of green cabbage

2-3T Better Than Bouillon, chicken

1/2c white rice

6-10oz roasted chicken meat

Drizzle the EVOO into a 4-5 quart heavy pan, heat the oil, then add the sliced or chopped carrots and celery, stir them around a bit, add seasonings now if you'd like. Cover and listen close for a couple minutes. This should bring out a bit of water out so they won't scorch. Next add the aromatics. chopped onion, red pepper and finely chopped garlic. Stir around the pan until the cooking water evaporates. Then add a little of the measured water as needed and again, cover and cook, once it simmers, over low heat for a few minutes.

Add about 2/3 of the remaining water, cubed cabbage and the BTB chicken stock base. Stir, simmer another 5 minutes, then add the rice, cook 15 minutes, stir in the chopped chicken meat, stir, remove from the heat, cover and let stand 10 minutes before serving.

Happy Creating! It's Always Soup Season . . . Lin

Lemon Chicken Rice Soup

Have you ever eaten something that was SO good you felt like it put you back in balance - without even knowing you were out of balance? That's how I often feel after I've made a big pot of Lemon Chicken Rice Soup.

I have several variations here, and of course, none quite like the next. I made this one using the vegetable broth I made the other day, which was a darker broth due to the purple onion in my bag of frozen vegetable scraps. It really has a lot of flavor. This soup came together quick, and it's so good, I'll savor every bowlful!

3 carrots

3 stalks celery

a little purple onion

2T butter and EVOO

Sauté these vegetables together until their scents are released and the onion is slightly brown.

Add the rice, stir and keep on the heat until it snaps, adding a couple cups of vegetable broth, a little at a time, to keep everything from sticking to the pot.

⅓-½c Carolina gold rice

~ or any 20 minute white rice ~

2 quarts homemade vegetable broth

Next add the rest of the chopped vegetables shown, stir and let sizzle a minute or two before adding the remainder of the broth.

3/4c purple onion

1/2c bell pepper

5 garlic cloves

Now, stir in the following:

7oz. roasted chicken meat

zest of 1/2 lemon

juice of the whole lemon

fresh ground black pepper

a little salt or garlic salt

2-3T chicken Better Than Bouillon

Bring this to a low simmer, check the flavors and make any necessary adjustments. This would be a great soup to make for someone fighting a virus, or to keep the viruses away. . .Lin

Gluten Free Chicken Noodle Soup

3 big carrots

3 stalks celery

1/4 med. onion - minced

2-3T EVOO

Chop the carrot and celery and sauté over medium heat, with the onion, until it they begin to brown. Add 32oz. chicken or vegetable broth. 

Slice then cube half a medium green cabbage. Rough chop the onion and add those to the pot with the bay leaves. Sauté  adding a little water as needed. You'll need about 32oz. fresh cold water in total. Add 2T powdered chicken soup base, pepper and simmer this for about an hour.

I roasted a chicken the other day and froze half. I'm using the rest for this soup. Remove the skin and bone from the chicken, saving those for bone broth. What remained was 12oz. of roasted chicken meat.

Add 2 blocks - 5oz. of millet and brown rice ramen noodles. Stir gently, until the noodles soften and separate. Add the chopped chicken. Stir and simmer another 10 minutes or so. At the end, I also added  a little lemon zest and 2T fresh lemon juice. This turned out SO well! . . Lin

Chicken and Liver Vegetable Soup

6 skinny dark green stalks of celery

3 really big carrots

1/2 med. onion (not shown)

2T single source EVOO

6c fresh cold filtered water

Lightly sauté the first group of sliced ingredients together while prepping all the rest. Stir often and add a little of the water as needed to keep it from sticking to the pan. After 10 minutes, add the next group of chopped-sliced vegetables and bring up to a medium simmer for 30 minutes.

2 big Idaho potatoes - peeled

1/2 med. tight head of green cabbage

3T Better Than Bouillon - chicken

32oz. chicken bone broth

Now add the following to the pot, along with the rest of the original 6c of water.

finely chopped celery greens

8oz. roasted chicken cut in bite size pieces

8oz. chicken liver cut into 1"x2" pieces

Stir, cover and simmer another 20 minutes. Check the flavors and make any adjustments. When the carrots are done the way you like them, Soup's Ready! . .Lin

Hearty Chicken Soup

vegetable 'scraps'

3/4 lg. green-orange pepper

2 carrots

3 stalks celery

1 med. onion

1/2c wild rice blend

4 peeled San Marzano tomatoes

~ To peel: drop them into rapidly boiling water for 10-15 seconds. Immediately, scoop them out with a large slotted spoon and into a container of ice water. Stir them gently, then leave to chill 10 minutes, then peel, quarter and chop.

Greens - thinly sliced:

kohlrabi greens

celery greens

green onion tops

2-3T chicken Better Than Bouillon

1-2T Penzey's Maharajah curry powder

8oz. roasted chicken cut in bite size pieces

Today my vegetable scraps were cabbage cores and odd onion pieces from making coleslaw yesterday, that I chopped fine.

The rest of the vegetables were chopped or sliced into a 3 quart pot with 2c of yesterdays coleslaw (from the top of the bowl to avoid the dressing) and 2T EVOO. Sauté these and the kohlrabi greens, which need more cooking than the other two, until sizzling. Add the rice, then add about 1c fresh cold water from a pitcher of 6 cups. Bring this to a strong bubble then reduce to a simmer, cover and let cook a half hour.

Add the tomatoes, the onion tops and celery greens, the rest of the water, soup base and curry powder. Simmer another half hour, stir in the chicken, cover and let stand another 10 minutes before serving. . .Lin

Chicken Leg-Gizzard Soup With Vegetables and Rice

The other day I was in one of our bigger grocery stores, looking for a protein other than chicken, since I've used that in so many recipes lately.  I did recently make a tiny pot of duck, lamb and barley soup, which I'm rationing, it's THAT good!  So when some Angus beef top round practically jumped into my cart, I thought. . ."DONE!"  Nope, not so fast Chicken Soup Woman!  What's that I see. . .beautiful packages of  chicken legs and gizzards on special.  88¢/# for the legs and 99¢/# for the gizzards!  I scored 8# of that, but put some away for another recipe.  My first thought was, I'll cook the meat together then pull the gizzards out for the dogs.

However, after a couple Google searches and finding YouTube cooks and chefs extolling the amazingness of Chicken Gizzards, well. . .we'll see how this goes as to who * eats what.  An article I read stated, "all gizzards are giblets, but not all giblets are gizzards."  Sounds like one of those math word problems.  Basically, when you buy a whole chicken it may contain a couple packages of giblets including a heart, neck, liver and gizzard (or stomach).  Collectively, these are called giblets.  Every time I hear  'gizzards' I smile, makes me think of a crabby old man, but that would be a geezer 😉 not a gizzard. . .but. . .technically, that old geezer HAS a gizzard!  One that will NOT end up in my soup!

DAY 1:
Put 3# of chicken legs and 2# of gizzards into a big deep pot.  Drizzle with 2T avocado oil and 2T of apple cider vinegar.  Sprinkle generously with your choice of spices or seasonings.  This time, instead of adding vegetables to make the bone broth, I decided to just stop here. Measure 7-8 cups of fresh cold water, into a pitcher.  Add 1 cup of the water to the pot then stir everything together with a big wooden spoon to coat all the parts and pieces.  Put over medium heat until the mixture begins to simmer well. Cover, shut off the heat, stir occasionally, but basically, leave it covered for an hour or so, to season and marinate all the meat.  (or just add more seasonings and water and skip the marinating time if you'd rather.)

Add the remaining 6-7 cups of water, cover and bring to a low simmer.  After about 75 minutes of total cooking time, using a big slotted spoon, remove and cool all the meat.  Skin and bone the chicken and cut the giblets into smaller pieces.  Set all the meat and gizzards aside.  Return the skin and bones to the pot, adding more water and seasonings if you want.  Simmer this covered for 6-10 hours then chill either in a freezer, or overnight in the 'fridge.  Or, if you live in Minnesota like I do, in the winter, just put it outside in a snowbank, securing the lid well to keep critters out.  Chill it until all the grease solidifies at the top of the liquid.

DAY 2:

Skim the fat layer off, strain the broth many times, through successively smaller mesh strainers, to get it as clear as possible.

In a 5 quart pot, heat a little butter, or oil.  When it's hot and starting to sizzling, add the chopped vegetables, 1⅓c white rice and chopped giblets.

Stir and add the well-strained bone broth in small amounts.  Continue to cook like a stir-fry for several minutes until the vegetables release their scents.  Add a total of 4-6 cups of broth, cover and simmer over low heat, for 15 or 20 minutes.  Simmer about 4oz. of fresh kale, separately, in a little bit of water for about 10 minutes.  Add that and the cooking water, to the pot.

At the very end of this time, add some of the more delicate anti-viral ingredients.  Today, it's chopped fresh and candied ginger, lemon zest and juice and celery tops that I added to simmer a few minutes longer. Gently stir everything, check the flavors, add more of the original seasonings or a little good quality (no MSG) soup base, pepper or whatever is needed.

Add however much chicken you want in the soup, a little or a lot, for the last 5 minutes of cooking, just to warm everything.  If there's leftover chicken, it's is good with steamed vegetables, added to a casserole, or made into chicken salad. . .Lin

* Okay, my verdict: Gizzards are Fabulous!  I did cut up some of the more grizzly parts for my dogs and cat and they also loved them!!

Be Bold - Be Creative - Stay Healthy and Make Soup!! . . . Lin

Chicken and Red Bean Soup

⅓c small red beans

4 chicken thighs

3 lg. carrots

2-3c sliced celery

6 lg. cloves garlic

4 lg. green onions

¼c sliced purple onion

1 15oz. can petite diced tomatoes

1-1½c dry white wine

bay leaves, Italian seasonings

garlic sea salt, fresh ground lemon pepper

Put the beans and a couple cups of cold water in a pot.  Bring to a simmer and cook for 15 minutes.  Drain, rinse and repeat.  Do this 2-3 times until the beans are just barely tender.  Skin the chicken, wash it in cool water and cut off all the fat.  Cut the chicken into bite size pieces and set aside.  

Slice, chop or dice the vegetables into a 3-5 quart pot.  Drizzle with just a little olive oil, stir then saute until the vegetables are scenting your kitchen.  Add the tomatoes, and wine.  I added only a little fresh ground lemon pepper.  The vegetables created so much flavor on their own!  Cover and simmer on low heat, adding a little water if needed and any herbs or seasoning you'd like.  Add chicken and beans, cover and simmer 30-45 minutes until the chicken is cooked, the beans are done and your kitchen smells heavenly. . .Lin