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Grandma's home-made Chicken Soup

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Who doesn't love a roast chicken dinner! It's super tasty & you can do so much with the left over chicken, even if you have other uses for the left-over chicken meat (maybe chicken & mushroom pie! :¬P), the carcass can be used to make a wholesome home-made soup. My Gran' taught my Mum & my Mum passed it down to me.

Just serve thoroughly warmed (not boiling) with fresh crusty white bread & lashings of butter. Everyone will love you!

Chicken soup in large dish

Here's what you need :¬)

serves 4 - 8

This recipe makes around 2L of soup

ingredients for stock

  • 1 bay leaf
  • 8 black peppercorns
  • 3 cloves
  • 1 1/2 pints of cold water
  • 1/2 onion
  • 1 carrot
  • 1 stick of celery
  • Veg peelings (not potatoes skin)
  • Chicken carcass (left-over bones from roast dinner)

ingredients for soup

  • 1/4 cup moong dhal (soaked in cold water for 10 mins)
  • 1/4 cup split red lentils (soaked in cold water for 10 mins)
  • 1/2 cup pearl barley
  • 2 med potatoes diced into 2.5cm pieces
  • 2 carrots diced into 5mm pieces
  • 1/2 white onion finely diced
  • 1 parsnip diced into 5mm pieces
  • stock (see above)

NB: lentils and moong dhal are just for thickening & protein, this is not a lentil dish!

Ingredients for seasoning:

  • 1 tsp coarse Himalayan Pink salt
  • 2 tsp light soy sauce
  • 2 tsp dark soy sauce
  • 1 veg stock cube
  • A dash of Worcestershire sauce (to taste)

Ingredients Optional Sunday Roast Dinner left-overs:

  • Spare roast chicken meat
  • Perline pasta
  • Home made chicken gravy
  • Home made onion sauce
  • Cooked veg

method

To make life easier for yourself, break down the chicken carcass while it is still warm. Pull off all the meat using your fingers and check thoroughly to make sure there are no bones hiding! If you try to do this with a carcass cold from the fridge it will take you at least twice as long because the chicken will not come off the bone as easily.

Set the bones aside for the stock, then, to make life easier for myself, I'll gather all the ingredients needed, so I don't forget anything!

store cupboard ingredients
ingredients
chopped veg & chicken
ingredients chopped

NB: The chopped chicken goes into the soup with the optional ingredients near to the end of the cooking process.

Method — Make the stock:

  1. place all the ingredients for the stock into a pressure cooker & cook for 45mins
  2. carefully let the pressure out of the pressure cooker
  3. through a fine sieve, drain the stock into a large bowl
  4. set the stock aside and discard the contents of the sieve

Method — Make the soup:

NB: do NOT add salt or any seasoning ingredients until step 5, or the lentils will never soften!

  1. place all the ingredients for the soup into the pressure cooker & cook for 35 mins
chicken stock & veg
veg-stock-pressure-cooker
  1. carefully let the pressure out of the pressure cooker
  2. check the lentils have virtually disappeared and the pearl barley is soft
  3. disolve your stock cubes in boiling water & add to the soup
  4. add all the ingredients for seasoning and stir well
  5. add the optional ingredients, stir, check seasoning & adjust to taste
  6. put the pressure cooker lid back on and set for 5 mins
  7. for best results, allow to cool and put in fridge overnight to mature the taste

NB: Warm through thoroughly when reheating, but don't allow the soup to boil. Check that the chicken & veg are piping hot before serving.

chicken Soup
chicken soup in container
ready for the fridge
chicken Soup
chicken soup cup
serve with fresh bread & butter

Delicious home-made chicken soup, just like grandma used to make it. Delicious served with crusty bread with lashings of butter. Pure comfort food at its best :¬)