By Your Intrepid Substitute Blogger
I stood in PCC in Kirkland last Wednesday and looked at the fish. I looked at the halibut cheeks (don’t like halibut), the shrimp (my little guy decided last week he doesn’t like it any more; plus we just had it), the wild Alaskan king and sockeye (I really prefer it grilled). My eye settled for a long while on the smoked salmon. I thought about piling it high on a bagel and I wondered at the fact that such a strong-tasting fish, raw yet, is something that can make me salivate when the rest of the seafood world is so off-putting. But I didn’t buy it. Instead, I decided to make a pot of soup. So many of my friends are struggling with the careening crud — it truly is something nasty that’s going around — that chicken soup seemed like a good idea.
As an actual Jewish mother, I feel very strongly in the medicinal qualities of my soup. So in the interest of healing all you sick people out there, here’s my recipe for a good chicken stock and how to turn it into soup.
I like to make soup after I’ve had a roasted chicken (or turkey): the addition of the bones from the carcase make for a richer stock. But if you don’t have any bones from a recent meal, take a whole chicken, remove the giblets and neck from the cavity. Put it in a pot. Cover it with water and add a bay leaf, some cracked pepper, a yellow onion, halved with the skin on, a couple broken carrots and a stalk of celery. Bring it to a boil then turn it down to a simmer – bubbles just breaking the surface now and again. Skim off any foam. Or don’t. It doesn’t affect the flavor.
After it’s simmered for a couple hours, strain out the broth. You can cool the bones and take off the meat for another use or to add to the soup when it’s done. The broth should taste rich. If it doesn’t, you want to take this strained version and reduce it – boil it off until it’s lost about a quarter of its volume. Taste it again. After it’s reached a point where it tastes like soup, let it cool a bit before refrigerating or freezing it over night. Then you can easily skim off the fat and discard it. The resulting stock can be used as the basis for a variety of soups, or as is. It freezes well — I do it in two-cup portions for cooking, and quart containers for soup purposes.
You don’t have to start with a whole chicken, either. I buy chicken and turkey backs and necks, as well as wings. They’re dirt cheap and offer a high bone to meat ratio, which makes for a richer broth.
Make the broth a meal by adding some sliced peeled carrots and parsnips, some chicken meat (either saved from the original roast chicken, or a diced up boneless skinless chicken breast or two), some cubed potatoes, rice or pasta, a couple of stalks of sliced celery, and at the very end of the cooking time, some peas, or some nice hearty greens like chard or kale. Make it more of a meal by adding some beans – kidney or garbanzo. You can give your soups an international flavor by playing with spices, too. Add some lime juice, chopped fresh cilantro, and cumin for a south of the border flavor. A little cayenne pepper will give it some kick. Garlic, red pepper flakes, grated fresh ginger, and a dash of toasted sesame oil gives it an Asian flare.
If you want to make a quick and luscious soup, take a quart of your stock and add a can of pumpkin or two cups of mashed winter squash and some grated fresh ginger. Instant fabulous pumpkin soup. This also works with curry powder. Top either off with some toasted pumpkin kernels and a dollop of sour cream or plain yogurt. A loaf of bread, some salad, a bottle of wine and you have an instant dinner that’s healthy and elegant.
But if you’re sick, stick with the chicken variety. It works.
: