Chicken Noodle Soup

Can you tell I'm ready for the cold weather?  One day last week, there was about an hour of cool breezes here in Houston and with all this talk of the first days of fall I had to make soup. Sure, the cool breeze had dissipated by the time I had even bought the ingredients from the store, but that didn't stop me.  I simply cranked down the air conditioning and enjoyed this wonderful soup.

Before I had ever made chicken noodle soup, I had quite the misconception that you must slave over the stove all day to produce a great batch.  Quite the contrary with this recipe I adapted from Rachael Ray.   I know she is quite the controversial topic in the food world, but you can't argue with her good recipes such as this one.  I did a little adapting, but have to say I might have already found my favorite chicken noodle soup recipe on the first try! You can put it together very quickly and the addition of the fresh herbs at the end, makes this a hearty yet fresh soup. Enjoy!

Chicken Noodle Soup

Adapted from Rachel Ray, Food Network

Servings: 4 large bowls, 6 regular bowls

Recipe Notes

If you have not heard me say this before, I am quite the salter.  I will just say I added quite a bit of salt to this and leave it at that.  My suggestion is that you wait till the soup is almost finished and taste and add salt slowly till it is to your taste.

Ingredients

2 tablespoons (2 turns around the pan) extra-virgin olive oil

2 medium carrots, peeled and chopped

1 parsnip, peeled and chopped

1 medium onion, chopped

2 ribs celery, chopped

2 bay leaves, fresh or dried

3 teaspoons of salt

1 teaspoon of pepper

10 cups good quality chicken stock (2 boxes)
1 pound (the average weight of 1 package) chicken breast tenders, diced
1/2 pound wide egg noodles
A handful fresh parsley, chopped
1 1/2 tablespoons of fresh dill, chopped

salt and pepper

Step by Step

1.  Place a large pot over moderate heat and add extra-virgin olive oil. 
2.  Work close to the stove and add vegetables to the pot as you chop, in the order they are listed.

3.  Add bay leaves and salt and pepper. 

4.  Add stock to the pot and and raise heat till soup comes to a boil. 

5.  Add diced chicken tenderloins, return soup to a boil, and reduce heat back to moderate. Cook chicken 

two minutes and add noodles. 

6.  Cook soup an additional 6 minutes or until noodles are tender and remove soup from the heat.

7. Stir in parsley and dill, remove bay leaves and add additional salt and pepper to taste.

8. This is a thick soup. Add up to 2 cups of water if you like chicken soup with lots of broth.

Ever seen one of these before?

I hadn't... It's a parsnip.  I was worried I was going to have to search the ends of the earth for what I thought was some fancy schmancy ingredient, but there it was at my local grocery store... amongst all the other produce I buy daily. If for some reason it is not at yours, I wouldn't sweat it... just add an extra carrot.

This went perfectly with mini cheese toasts.