How To Make Chicken Soup With Leftover Chicken

The author and his soup

So you’ve bought a roasted chicken for dinner and stuffed your face ’til you can’t eat any more.  Now you’re wondering what to do with all that yummy leftover chicken.  While there’s a plethora of ideas, from a chicken sandwich to chicken salad, but one idea I really enjoy is turning my leftover roasted chicken into hearty chicken soup.  Especially at this time of year, when it’s getting to be cold season and everyone around you is getting sick, it’s the perfect time to make a batch of soup.  So here’s my recipe.  Hope you enjoy!

What you’ll need:

1 leftover chicken

1 1/2 onions

4 baby carrots

1 potato

1/2 a box of spaghetti

Dash of pepper, salt

Once you’ve finished as much of the chicken from your original meal as you want, store the chicken in your refrigerator for seven days.   A good tool to keep track of your aging chicken is to remember that this is the same amount of time it took God to create the universe.  Think of your chicken as being reborn again.  Storing the chicken is easy.  You can store it in the same container you bought it in.  After seven days, the chicken is ready to be another meal.

On the seventh day, you’re ready to cook (despite the wishes of others).  At this point, it’s very important that you don’t call your mom.  Though your mother may have a great chicken soup and know her way around a kitchen, have pride in your ability to not want help.  Also, you have the internet at your disposal, and that’s never been wrong when it comes to chicken soup.

Start by filling a large pot with water.  Fill it near to the top and put it over the fire.  While it’s heating up, put the chicken in.  There’s no need to cut it up.  Once it’s in there long enough, the meat will fall right off the bones.  Add 3 boulilon cubes for flavor.  Next, chop up some onions -alot of onions.  I like to use about one and a half.  A sweet onion work fine for me.  Next, chop up about 3 or 4 baby carrots.  A good trick is to snack on the bag the whole week until you remember your leftover chicken in the fridge and why you bought the carrots in the first place.  By then there should be just the right amount left.  Follow this up with the cut up potato.  After you’ve added your vegetables, you may want to add some spaghetti to the pot.  I like to take the box of spaghetti out of the cabinet upside down so that it all falls on the floor first before I put it in my soup.  This allows you to wonder why you’re doing this in the first place.  It’s a good idea to rinse it as well, but this is really optional.

By now your soup should be a cloudy white and your home should smell like a bad jewish butcher.  If you’re waiting for a film of chicken fat to appear at the top of your soup that you should remove, you may want to just dunk around the dirty white cloud instead.  Look for anything that looks too uninviting.  I like to pull out the smaller bones, any black stringy things, and the lungs.  Don’t be too worried if there’s alot you want to pull out.  If you’re like me, you’re anticipating the clean up and pulling things out will only help you with this once you’re done.

Next, turn the fire off and spoon out some soup.  You should only eat a bowl or so as a taste test.  At this point, the soup isn’t ready yet and you’ll know it.  Take the soup, now cooling, and heave it into three tupperware bins.  You’ll want to freeze the first two and refrigerate the third for when you’re hungrier.  If you’ve lost some of your appetite, your soup should almost be ready.

Wait two days and talk to your mom and ask her about the color.  If you’ve followed all the directions correctly, then your mother’s response should be something like ‘I’ve never, ever, ever made, or heard of, making chicken soup with leftover chicken’.  Again, something like this.  Depending on your mother this answer may vary.

If you’ve done everything right up to this point, then by the third day, your throat should be scratchy and your stomach will hurt. Remember, feeling sick is exactly why you made the soup in the first place.  Picturing the soup as what you’ll eat should also make you feel sick at this point so be sure to stop by the market and buy some fresh chicken soup.  Buy a potato as well for a simple baked potato.  Bring both these ingredients home.

Wrap the potato in aluminum foil and put it in the oven at 450 for about an hour.  Take the soup you just bought and put the soup in a bowl, add a dash of salt and pepper to your liking and enjoy!

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Addt’l notes:

You may also want to consider that the soup is what made you sick, but this is not a necessary step to the final dish.

Its helpful to keep the three soups in your refrigerator as long you don’t want to think about washing the tupperware.

If you’re worried about what to do with all the soup, try giving some to your girlfriend and her friends.  However be prepared to loose your tupperware.

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Tags: deadpan, leftover chicken, roasted, soup recipe