thrifty chick-n-soup

I usually cook two chickens on the weekend & use the meat to make soup, enchiladas, sanwiches, etc. throughout the week. Same goes for vegetables. Buy what you need for the whole week & chop them up on Sunday. The great thing about cooking the whole bird is, once you get it started, you can pretty much leave it unattended for a couple of hours. This leaves you plenty of time to read a good book, clean the house or watch the Nate Berkus Show.

Todays recipe - boil your whole chicken:

Take the bird out of the bag. Rinse him inside & out under cold water & put him in a huge pot. (A lot of recipes call for vegetables to be cooked with the chicken & discarded when done. I suppose it gives the broth more flavor, but I don't want to throw out my hard-earned veggies. So, for me, it's just a lonely chicken in the pot. He'll get visitors later.) Fill the pot with enough water to cover the bird & bring to a boil. As soon as the water starts to boil, turn down the heat & let him simmer in the hot tub for about 1 1/2 - 2 hours. You will know the meat is done when you pull on a leg bone & the meat falls right off. Turn off the heat & let the pot cool. When it has cooled some, you can ladle the broth into jars for future use. Pick the meat from the bones, pack in a bowl & refrigerate.

Weekday chicken Soup Recipe:

For this recipe, I chopped-up any cooked chicken that wasn't pretty enough for a chicken sandwich. About 2 cups?

plus...

8 oz. dry noodles

3 quarts chicken broth

A couple carrots & stalks of celery, chopped

A handful of chopped onion

salt, pepper, dried dill

In a soup pot, bring the broth to a boil. Add the carrots, celery and onions. Cook until the carrots start to soften up. About 10 minutes. Add noodles. Cook for another 5-6 minutes. Add the chicken and seasonings. Cook until the chicken is warm & noodles are cooked.