Chicken and rice soup?!
Chicken and rice soup?
Hi,looking for good receipe for this soup.
Any help would be greatful.
regards,
ja
Answers:
I don't use a recipe but I can describe what you do:
Buy a package of fresh chicken pieces. Wash them lightly and then put in a pot. Cover with cold water. Add a bay leaf. Add some chopped celery, some chopped carrots and some chopped onion and some chopped parsley.
Bring the water to a boil and then lower the heat to low or simmer. Cook for an hour. Test the meat. Lift the chicken pieces out of the broth and let them cool. Meanwhile, continue to cook the broth on low heat.
When the meat is cool, strip the pieces of their skin and pick the pieces of meat off the bone. Chop them to the small size (or larger) that you want and put them in a container in the refrigerator.
You have all those bones left. Put them back in the broth and continue to cook for another hour or so.
At the end of the hour, pour the broth through a strainer into a metal bowl or something heat-resistent. Let it cool off a little bit and put the bowl, covered with plastic wrap, in the refrigerator.
Wait about two hours or longer - you want the broth to chill. When it is cold, take it out of the refrigerator and notice that the fat from the chicken skin has hardened and is floating on the top of the broth. Lift off most of it with a spoon. It has flavor but it is also greasy. So leave just a little. The broth is still flavorful without it.
Since this is not a recipe with a lot of measuring to it, my suggestion is to cook your rice (brown or white or whatever) in the microwave. Or you can cook on the stovetop or in the oven, however you feel comfortable cooking rice. Then cook some nicely diced or chopped vegetables such as carrots, onions, celery, zucchini, peas, potatoes, etc. in the microwave, stovetop, or oven. Salt the water the vegetables cook in, especially the potatoes. Salt them if you roast them in the oven. But don't overdo it.
Heat up your broth, snip some fresh herbs such as parsley or sage or dill or thyme - your choice - and add to the broth. Add your own combination of cooked vegetables, add your rice and at the very end, add your cooked chicken. Bring the heat up so the soup is very hot. Finally, season with some sea salt (my favorite) but just a little at at time, tasting, tasting, tasting. Remember that your vegetables were salted.
Then serve very hot.
If the broth is not flavorful enough for you, add more chicken pieces next time! A good practice is to make a lot of chicken broth so you have some to start with when you add the meat. Or you can used canned chicken broth but then it won't taste as homemade and fresh.