I used to love volunteering at my girls’ elementary schools. Yes plural on schools. They went to two different ones because we moved in the middle of those years.
One of my favorite places to volunteer was in the school library. All those books! And the librarian at their second school became a good friend–before working in the library she was one daughter’s 2nd grade teacher. She was amazing.
Anyway, one aspect of volunteering in the library was working the Scholastic Book Fairs and, since I had been a bank teller for several years in my single days, I usually worked “register” and did the deposit at the end of the fair.
Why am I telling you all of this? Well, when you work at the book fairs you have early access to the books on sale and I would always check them out to see if their were any books that appealed to me. Cookbooks were a favorite and I still have one called “Rise and Dine America”, full of Bed & Breakfast recipes from across the country. Perhaps I will share a few at some point.
Today’s recipe comes from one of those book fair cookbooks, entitled “Is it Soup Yet?” I haven’t tried very many of these soups but this happens to be the very first recipe in the book and we really like it. I actually have substituted Thrive Foods for several of the ingredients, and have noted that in the recipe.
It’s Fall y’all, and at some point–not right now because in the South we are still pretty darn warm–you are going to be craving some good old comfort food and that will include soups and stews, so get ready!
- 3 lb. fryer
- 3 bay leaves
- 6 peppercorns
- 7 stalks of celery (I used 3 stalks, then 2 cups of sliced Thrive celery, cut up)
- 2 cups chicken broth (I used Thrive Chicken Bouillion)
- 1 large onion minced (1.5 cups Thrive Chopped Onion)
- 3 carrots, julienne sliced
- 1 T. dried parsley (Thrive)
- 1/2 lb. thin egg noodles (Thrive)
- 1 (10 oz.) package frozen peas (Thrive)
- 3 t. salt (Thrive)
- 1 t. ground white pepper
- 1 t. of your favorite all-purpose seasoning
- Remove the neck and gizzard pack from the cavity of the chicken.
- Place the chicken into a 6 quart stock pot and cover with water. Add the bay leaves, peppercorns and 3 stalks of celery, broken in half.
- Cook over high heat until the water comes to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 1 hour or until the chicken falls off the bone.
- Remove the chicken to cool and strain the broth.
- Return the liquid to the pot, then add 2 cups of chicken broth, minced onion, 4 stalks of celery minced or Thrive celery slices cut up, carrots, dried parsley, and egg noodles. Cook over high heat until the noodles are soft.
- Chop the chicken into bite size pieces and add along with the peas to the broth.
- Season with salt, white pepper and other seasoning of choice.
- Cook for approximately 10 minutes or until the peas are heated through.
- Original recipe calls for Accent seasoning but I did not include that. I had a packet of Thrive seasoning left from something else and wanted to use it instead. I believe that Accent actually contains MSG, so no.