Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup: A Family Heritage Recipe

The classic chicken noodle soup, anyone can do it and make it. Although its simplicity, it’s sometimes known as a more intimidating dish due to the cooking of chicken. But dont worry, were gonna handle this one together.

This dish has been in my family and heritage for a very long time. Over this period it has been tweaked and changed into the dish my family has atleast once a week. It’s has a few altered flavours that may surprise you, but thats what makes it so good.

Ingredients

As always you will need a large pot to start with so water will very depending on the batch your making. I reccomend for a large pot fill it about 3/4 of the way full with water and stock which we will proceed to later.

• 2-3 cups of low sodium chicken broth
• Water
• Chicken thighs or breast
• 3-5 Chicken boullion cubes (add more if needed)
• 1/2 large bundle of dill
• 3 tbs olive oil
• 4-5 large carrots
• 3-5 large celery
• 1 onion
• Salt
• Pepper
• Garlic powder
• Egg noodles (thin ones)

Chicken!

Lets start with the scary part! Chicken. I reccomend chicken thighs as they cook faster than breasts and are easier to shred but if you are using chicken breast make sure to cook it longer than the reccomended amount here.

1. Start by preheating your pot on medium high heat and add 3 tablespoons of olive oil to cover the bottom of the pan. You will use the same pot for everything so make sure its a large enough pot for your soup as well.
2. While your pan is preheating you can start seasoning your chicken, you dont need much as it will soak in the flavour of the soup later as well. You will use an even amount of salt, pepper and garlic powder to coat the chicken and thats all you need.
3. Once the pot is heated, lay your chicken in away from you to prevent oil splatters. Cook each thigh for 3-4 minutes of each side flipping twice.
4. Dont be scared to cut in and check the chicken if unsure, since it will be shredded later anways.
5. Once done take it out and lay to the side till ready for use later.

IMPORTANT

Do not wash your pan once done cooking the chicken! The brown bits at the bottom of your pan is the fond, this will flavour your soup and broth.

Vegetables

Now it’s time to saute your vegtables. In the same pan as used for your chicken turn it to medium low.

1. While your pan is cooling down, you can start chopping your vegtables. For the carrots, i reccomend doing thin slice of carrots into circles and for the celery two inch long cuts. You can cut your onion however you please but for my onion lovers out there i reccomending cutting your onion into 4 and seperating each peice so you have big chunks.
2. For your dill, only use half of what you need now throw it in with the veggies, make sure to take of the stems.
3. Now that your pan is cooled you can throw in your veggies and saute them for 7-10 minutes. The fond should start to scrape of the bottom and incorporate into the flavour.
4. Add a sprinkle of salt, pepper, and garlic powder but not too much as more salt will come later.
5. Once they are done we can move onto the broth and leave the veggies in the pot.

Broth

Time to start the base of the soup.

1. Pour 2-3 cups of chicken broth ontop of your vegtables, give it a good mix then fill with water to 3/4 the size of the pot. If the taste of the broth itself is getting lost in the water add more chicken broth and pour water in slowly.
2. Now turn your heat up to medium high to get a slow boil.
3. Once boiling, you can add you chicken boullion cubes. Start with 3 then add more as needed to get to the saltiness you desire. Make sure they are all incoporated before adding more.
4. If your soup is still not to the saltiness you desire, dont worry! You can add vegeta if you have it, or just plain table salt which would only probably be needed in a large batch.
5. Now that it’s boiling throw in your chicken then turn heat to a simmer.
6. Once simmering incoporate the rest of your dill and add salt and pepper to taste.
7. Let simmer for 20-30 minutes for all flavours to incoporate.

Finishing steps, Noodles!

Your almost done! Lets put everything together.

1. Before you shred your chicken, put a pot on the stove and get it to a rolling boil and dont forget to incoporate salt!
2. Take out your chicken from the soup. At this point it should be very soft. You can take two forks and shred it to your liking then throw it back into the soup.
3. Now that your water is boiling, it’s time for the noodles, i reccomend the Bechtle thin soup egg noodles. For cooking them i reccomend no longer than 3 minutes and drain them well with a splash of oil so they dont stick.

Now your soup is ready! Enjoy!

Tips and Tricks

1. I dont reccomend boiling your noodles with your soup as they can become soggy, make sure you do them seperately and dont overcook them.
2. Add cayenne powder for a little bit of heat.
3. Add more dill if your as big of a fan as me!

See you next time lovely readers!