My mother threw the whole produce market into that soup, and she was paid for her efforts in deep, satisfying flavor.
Chicken Soup
Servings
8 Servings
Ingredients
- 2 chickens 3 1/2 to 4 pounds each with giblets (no liver), quartered
- 2 pounds carrots yes, 2 pounds, not 2 carrots
- 2 large onions cut in half
- 5 large ribs celery cut in half
- 2 large parsnips
- 1 small sweet potato 6 ounces, cut in half
- 1 turnip 6 ounces, cut in half
- 1 rutabaga 6 ounces, cut in half
- 1 small celery root cut in half (optional)
- 1/2 large green bell pepper stemmed and seeded
- 1/2 large yellow pepper stemmed and seeded
- 2 bunches dill coarsely chopped (about 1½ cups)
- 1/2 bunch curly-leaf parsley about ¼ cup
- 3 cloves garlic
- Kosher coarse salt and black pepper to taste
- Chopped dill for serving (optional)
Instructions
- Place the chicken in a 12- to 16-quart stockpot and add water to barely cover. Bring just to the boiling point. Then reduce the heat to a simmer and skim off the foam that rises to the top. Add all the remaining ingredients (except the optional chopped dill) and only enough water to come within about two thirds of the height of the vegetables in the pot. (Most recipes will tell you to add water to cover. Do not do this! You want elixir of the gods or weak tea? As the soup cooks, the vegetables will sink and will be covered soon enough. Eight to 10 cups of water total is plenty for this highly flavorful brew.) Simmer, covered, until the chicken is cooked through, about 1 1/2 hours.
- Remove the chicken and about half the carrots from the pot, and set them aside.
- Strain the soup through a fine-mesh strainer into another pot or container, pressing on the vegetables to extract all the flavor. Scrape the underside of the strainer with a rubber spatula and add the pulp to the soup. Discard the fibrous vegetable membranes that remain in the strainer. If you’re fussy about clarity (and we’re not), you can strain it again through a fine tea strainer, but there goes some of the flavor. Cover the soup and refrigerate overnight.
- When you are ready to serve the soup, scoop the congealed fat off the surface and discard it. Reheat, adding more dill if desired (and we do). Slice the reserved carrots and add them to the soup. Serve the soup with matzoh balls and lukshen (thin noodles) or on Passover with mandlen (soup nuts).
Why was for Passover? Today, I made your chicken soup following your video, almost. My past efforts were bland, so I bought an abundance of chicken carcass parts “for soup” and frozen beef feet from the Kosher butcher (they did not have knuckles). I added two leg/thigh combos. Equally distributed meat and bones in the bottom of two 8-qt pots, our largest. Added the veggies on top – lots of onions, parsnips, carrots, a whole cut up celery root, celery stalks. I did not have turnips. I removed the schmutz, added the peppercorns and flat leaf parsley. I do not have cloves or the other “berries” shown in that video, either. I let it go for a couple of hours, simmering slowly, confident I would have a good stock, a good base which I would finish tomorrow, then in separate pots make fresh matzo balls and egg noodles, julienne some carrots and daikon to add once the soup is in the bowl. The plan is to dish up the soup and then let everyone take their noodles from its pot, add their own matzo balls (I have one here who likes lead, another who, as I, prefers big and fluffy ones).
I thought it was a good idea to add the beef parts for the collagen, but I am afraid I may have ruined it. Instead of having a bit of sweetness (even if bland) as I am accustomed to, it is anything but. It would seem that the beef feet addition has overwhelmed the stock, at least the odor of the stock.
Salt has not yet been added.
Both pots have cooled and been strained, then combined into one pot.
Now the pot is in the fridge for its overnight rest.
I will slowly simmer a couple of chicken breasts in the soup tomorrow and not overcook them so I can shred the meat and let everyone add the amount they wish to their soup, keeping the soup free of anything in the broth when served. I also will plan to cook a couple of parsnips and more carrots, then remove before they are overcooked, cutting them up and reserving them to add to bowls of soup and not to the pot.
How can I fix it tomorrow with existing ingredients to give it the sweetness of both aroma and taste I want it to have?
I think your plan is good and cooking the carrots in the soup should give it the sweetness you are looking for.