Tuesday, August 19, 2014

The absolute minimum difficulty recipe with maximum impact: authentic chicken soup

I like cooking, and I like to share that joy. If  you can’t cook however, your first efforts are likely to be mediocre, which is not very encouraging. “Why bother?!”.


In this post, I’ll share something that can barely be called a recipe, that’s how simple it is. BUT! The results are entirely authentic and spectacular. You can take this with you to a home cooked dinner, and your friends will be very happy with your efforts. They will ask you for the recipe! Little will they know how easy it is. Also, it is almost impossible to mess this up. I dare you to try ;-)


Ingredients: 10-20 raw chicken wings (plain or spiced, NOT breaded!), 2-4 onions, a few large carrots (or more smaller ones), salt, pepper.
Required equipment: oven-proof container, oven, pan, stove, strainer or colander.
Time spent in the kitchen: 15 minutes


Pre-heat oven to 180C (350F). Meanwhile, put the chicken wings in the oven-proof container. If you got plain wings, add some salt and pepper.  If you have it, sprinkle some oil over the chicken wings.


Put container with chicken in oven (if at temperature). Then you can wait 25 minutes, you can wait 35 minutes, you can wait 45 minutes, and in every case you’ll have some pretty good chicken wings. If after 25 minutes they look ready to eat, they ARE. Do not eat unless thoroughly hot inside!


(if you don’t have an oven, you can also fry the chicken wings in a pan on a stove, works just as well, but you need to pay some closer attention to getting them browned all round and well done inside. Will require more oil).


Now for the surprising part. Eat as many of the chicken wings as you feel like. No need to finish them all. This was not your special dinner ;-)


Next, fill a pan with a few liters (quarts) of water, then throw in all your chicken wings, the ones you ate, the ones you didn’t. Peel onions, cut in large chunks, add to water. Chuck the carrots in there too. Bring water to a boil, turn down heat and leave to simmer for 3, 4, 5, hell 6 hours if you feel like it. If during the boiling you note brown stuff floating on the water, remove that with a spoon. Your house will smell lovely meanwhile.


Afterwards, use colander or strainer to filter out all the bones and pieces of meat. (You can add back the pieces of meat if you want.) Now taste the soup and add salt to taste. This part is not optional, it really needs salt.


That’s it! You can take the soup with you to a party and heat it there. In a fridge it will last for days.


Note: to improve on this soup, add more vegetables (doesn’t really matter which ones), or instead of chicken wings, use an entire chicken.