Chicken Noodle Soup

I roasted another 5 lb bag of leg quarters the other day and then made a big batch of stock.

I saved back the stock and part of the chicken so I could make a big pot of soup.  I just wasn’t sure what kind I wanted to make I thought about Tuscan Chicken Soup  but I didn’t have any kale and without the kale it’s just not the same, then I was thinking Tortilla Soup but I didn’t have any Rotel.  Then I remembered we never had our traditional after Thanksgiving Homemade Chicken Noodle soup.  Something my mom has been making for use since we were kids.  So I decided that Chicken Noodle sounded wonderful.

With Cindy and my aunt Val at the hospital most of the day I needed it to be something that would easy have hot and ready to eat whenever they straggled in. So instead of cooking the pasta in the soup I cooked it and let everyone put what they wanted in their bowls.  Makes it easier to freeze left overs too.

Ingredients:

• 4 cups chick stock (home made if you have it)
• 3-4 cup water
• 2 cups pre-cooked chicken
• 1/4 onion, chopped
• 1/2 cup sliced carrots
• 3/4 cup chopped celery
• 4 gloves garlic, minced
• Salt and fresh ground black pepper (a good shake of red pepper flakes adds a nice kick if you like)
• Pre-cooked Dreamfield’s Pasta (we use the linguini)

Method:

1. Saute veggies in a tsp. pork fat or butter
2. Add stock and water let simmer until veggies are tender.  Don’t over cooked, remember you stock is already flavored
3. Add chicken and season well.
4. Serve with pasta and crackers for your carbivores. 

Some folks find that Dreamfields Pasta cause them blood glucose spikes, mom and I are among them, so we only use just a little pasta.  I think I had about a 1/3 cup of cooked pasta or about 1/3 a serving in my bowl, if that.  Of course you could use shirataki, or simply skip the noodles all together.

Don’t skimp on the garlic or it won’t be nearly as good, even though this is not a garlicky soup by any means.

Since pasta doesn’t freeze well and get mushy when reheating, having the pasta separate makes left overs much better or you can just freeze the left overs for another day.

(I didn’t get a picture today, but I’ll try to get one tomorrow when I have left overs)

Cabbage soup with Sausage

As you know I'm the queen of short cuts. I love all things that make getting dinner on the table quicker. I like to precook veggies so they are ready to go with whatever protein I cook for that night. While all veggies don't keep well, things like cabbage, turnips and squash all work wonderfully for this.
So today mom decided she needed to add a little something to her egg fast and boiled a whole head of cabbage. Boiled cabbage is something we both really like and it goes with most any meat you cook, so we like to keep it cooked.
But tonight I wasn't feeling great, it's this changing weather, and I wanted soup. This is the quick and easy soup I managed to get in a bowl in less than 3o minutes.

Quick and Easy Cabbage Soup with Sausage

• 8 oz. sausage cut into bite sized pieces
• 1/4 med. onion, diced
• 1/2 cup chicken stock
• 3-4 cups cooked cabbage with cooking liquid
• 1/2 cup cooked turnips or thawed frozen would work
• 1/4 cup of cream
• dash or two of salt
• 2 tsp. fresh ground black pepper (can use less but I love cabbage with lots of black pepper)
• Optional: fresh grated parmesan to sprinkle over each bowl

Add sausage to a hot pan and cook until brown, deglaze pan with just a little chicken stock and add onions and turnips and saute until tender and starting to caramelize. Add cabbage, the remaining chicken stock, spices and cream. Heat until just bubbling. Don't boil with the cream in the soup. Serve immediately with a nice sprinkle of fresh grated parmesan and a piece of Jalapeno Flaxbread.

It made a very warm, comforting and super easy dinner and boy has it kept me full!

Icebox soup a tribute to my Nanny

As I was putting together this soup, I was thinking about my wonderful grandmother and all the things I learned from her.

She grew up in the first part of the 20 century and was raising a family during the Depression. She could create anything from next to nothing.

I have a pair of my fathers baby shoes she sewed for him out of an old pair of my grandfathers wore out overalls. The souls were cut from the tongue from my grandfathers work boots. She used whatever fabric scraps she could find to piece quilts to keep her family warm.

As each of her 15 grandchildren were born, she made cloths for them and every Christmas she made matching dresses and shirts for all of us. Our Christmas present from her and my grandfather was always a granny gown for all us girls and jammies for the boys. The highlight of every Christmas eve was when we opened the packages and all ran squealing to put on or new granny gowns; which we wore for the rest of the night. I'm sure the boys weren't nearly so heart broken as we girl were, when it got to be too much for her and the granny gowns stopped. But you ask anyone of use granddaughters about Christmas with Nanny and they will tell you about the granny gowns.

We all looked forward to summer when we all got to go spend a week with Nanny and granddaddy. My dad had 3 sisters, each of them had kids within a year or so of each other, 3 different times. My aunt Marie and Uncle Fred had a spare and had the oldest and youngest in the older group, so there for 5 of them.
Each group got to spend a full week sometimes two. We all waiting with great anticipation for our time to go hangout with our cousins and spend time with our grandparents.

They didn't have much but it was always so much fun! She had dolls and toys all stored in the spare bedroom. Our room. She made all the dolls had underwear made from the foot of an old sock with holes cut for the legs and then sewn together over the shoulders. Nanny hated naked baby-dolls. She passed this trait on to me. All the baby-dolls in my classrooms were required to be dressed before putting away, and several of them had Nannyware. :o)

When I was 7 my grandfather passed away and the big summer visits stopped. They were afraid Nanny couldn't handle us in big groups by herself, she had had a major stroke and heart attacks before I was born. So we went two at a time for a few years.

She was an amazing woman and I miss her dearly. Even after her health had deteriorated enough that she needed to live in a nursing home, she still set up quilting bees with the ladies there, taught crocheting, helped set up activities and led outings. She was very very active until the last 6months of her life, and lived on her own until the last 2. She was 90 when she passed away on a cool Sunday morning in October.

While Nanny could bake anyone under the table, she wasn't a particularly good cook. This recipe if you call it that, is one I got from spending weekends with her. She simply called it soup, but the rest of us called it Icebox Soup. Simply stated, whatever was in her fridge went into the soup pot. You might find ham, turkey, chicken, beef or all the above in your bowl. Sometimes there was corn, mac&cheese, spinach, beans or okra floating in it. The only negative thing I remember about staying with Nanny and Granddaddy was this soup and her mashed potatoes, which I later found out were turnips...giggle (I really like turnips now)
I have found that with the right ingredients Icebox soup is very very good and a great way to use up little bits and pieces of left overs. Nanny never threw out anything, with prices like they are now, I'm finding making this soup for lunch, very wallet friendly.

Icebox Soup

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup chopped onion
• 1-2 cloves garlic, minced
• any little pieces of raw veggies you have left in your veggie draw
• tbsp butter or oil of your choice
• Chicken or beef stock, water, wine or whatever liquid you like
• Left over beef, pork OR poultry ( unless your like Nanny and like them all mixed up)
• Left over veggies
• Seasoning of choice if needed

Method:

1. Saute onion and garlic in butter or oil. Add any bits and pieces of raw veggies you have on hand. I had a zucchini nub, 1/4 of a red pepper and 1/2 plum tomato. Saute until tender.
2. Season. I only used salt and pepper because the meat was already seasoned.
3. Add whatever meat you have left over, I used left over taco meat Saute a few minutes.
4. Add stock, water, wine or whatever liquid you've chosen to use. I used chicken stock and a little red wine I had hanging out that needed to be used. Let come to a boil and then lower to simmer.
5. Add left over veggies turn off heat and let set just long enough to heat veggies. You DO NOT want to over cook them.
6. Ladle into your cup or bowl top with grated cheese, fresh grated parmesan, dollop of sour cream or whatever will go well with your combo. I used a little shredded Mexican blend.

This is great way to re-purpose left overs into something completely different and absolutely delicious. The trick is just cook until everything is hot. Most of your ingredients are already cooked. You just want to gently heat them. No one wants a big bowl of over cooked, mushy, bitter vegetables.

So fix you a nice bowl of Icebox soup and think of all the fond memories you have of your grandparents.

Cream of tomato soup and grilled cheese sammiches

As a kid and own into adult hood one of my favorite comfort food combo's has always been a grilled cheese sandwich and a bowl of Cambells cream of tomato soup. What's not to like? The sandwich is ooey gooey cheesey on the inside and buttery toasty on the outside. The soup is rich and creamy with the addition of sweetness to off set the saltiness of the cheese. You ladle up the soup in a big cup set in the middle of your sandwich plate with your grilled cheese cut diagnally into two toasty triangles. The best part is dipping the sandwich in the soup. Oh my goodness makes me all warm and cozy just thinking about it. I decided that since I'm not counting veggies on my new plan the soup would be doable IF I made it myself. Never having made tomato soup I figured the simpler the better so I grabbed a big can of tomato sauce. What goes better with tomatoes than basil, so I grabbed it too. Into the pot went the tomato sauce, the top sprinkled with basil. Cambells soup is sweet and since I wanted to relive that comfort food from the past, into the pot went a few drops of sweetzfree ( cambells is to sweet so I didn't add that much sweetzfree) as it started to heat I added a cup of Hood's count down milk. Oh imagine my delight when it turned the exact color of Cambells and a finger dipped in the pot told me it was perfect. I let it heat through while I toasted a couple of cheese sandwiches made on Joseph's Lavash bread. In less than 20 minutes I had soup and sandwiches ready for mom and I and they were absolutely wonderful. The lavash bread toasted up wonderfully buttery and just slightly crisp with lots of gooey stringy cheese. Perfect for dipping in the soup. MMM MMM Good!
Forgive me, I got so caught up in make and eating, I forgot to take a picture. Next time. There's at least another bowls worth of soup in the fridge and I always have lavash and cheese.