The dark and cold days across the UK mean one thing for foodies – it’s soup season. The combination of a warm bowl and a rich soup is the perfect way to stay cosy on wintery evenings.
As well as providing warmth and a nutritious meal, soups are easy to make in large batches meaning they can be reheated for days and weeks to come. They are considered the ultimate comfort food and often compared to a “hug in a bowl”. Chicken is one of the most popular flavours of soup, known for its deep and rich flavour.
Catherine Jessee, a chef and writer at All Recipes, a community-driven food website, recently shared her chicken soup recipe. She revealed that her “secret” lies in her use of a fortified broth which deepens the flavour of the soup as it cooks.
Catherine said: “In preparation for a much-anticipated Soup Season—and the various penicillins that keep my seasonal colds at bay—I’ve gotten into the habit of making a biweekly chicken stock.”
She added: “With so much on hand, I’m recycling the same stock that I make to make fortified stock. With it, even the tastiest chicken soup dinners have reached new levels of flavor—and they’re the best they’ve ever been.”
Catherine explained how she freezes half of her chicken stock before using the other half to make the soup. She said the stock “deepens the flavor as it cooks”.
The chef continued: “It definitely helps that celery, onions, and carrots, as well as chicken legs and quarters (which I prefer anyway) tend to be the cheapest selection of veggies and chicken respectively.
“This makes it easy—and budget-friendly—to make your own sippable fortified stock, and to stay stocked (pun intended) for cooking adventures throughout the week.”
The ingredients for her fortified stock include leftover chicken (or chicken bones), celery, carrots, onion and chicken stock. She advises adding the celery, carrots and onion to a pressure cooker.
You should then add the chicken stock to cover the ingredients by around one inch. Catherine added: “Set the pressure cooker to cook over high heat over high pressure until vegetables are soft and meat is tender and falling off the bone, about 30 to 45 minutes.”
