Soup glorious soup - Asian-style chicken noodle

One of my favourite things about cooler weather is that I can eat soup. Lots of soup. Growing up we used to have a small bowl of vegetable soup before nearly every evening meal, which I grew to love - especially as our house always seemed to be freezing! 

I must even confess that I have tried a few "soup" diets over the years. Fortunately for those around me, the cabbage soup diet lasted about 1 meal. Cabbage, I quickly discovered, was not my favourite veggie to add to soup. Yuk. 

Fortunately for me, my beloved also loves soup. His favourite is pea and ham, and I nearly always have a couple of containers of that in the freezer. 

I love Asian soups - with tender morsels of meat, slippery noodles, fragrant herbs, hot chilli and the tang of lime juice. 

Today's lunch was this Asian-style chicken noodle soup, quickly whipped up in about 10 minutes. On the weekend I had poached a whole chicken, so I could replenish my chicken stock supply and also have some beautiful shredded chicken for a few meals this week.  

To make the stock:

• 1 whole chicken (I usually try and get an organic or free range chicken)
• 10 slices of ginger
• 3-4 cloves of garlic, peeled and smashed
• 10 coriander seeds
• 2-3 star anise
• 5 white pepper seeds
• 1 onion quartered

Pop all this in a large stock pot with 4 litres of cold water. Bring to the boil, then simmer with lid on for about 90 minutes. Skim off any impurities. After 90 minutes turn off the heat and leave to cool for about an hour. Remove the chicken, once it's cool, remove and throw out skin and bones. Save the meat for meals during the week. Strain the liquid into another container, throw out the solids. Keep the liquid in the fridge for 2-3 days or in the freezer for up to 2 months.

I normally try and make the stock a day or so before I need it so that I can skim any fat off the surface once it has cooled. Although this should be minimal. 

mmmm soup :)

To make the soup for 2 people you need:

• 750ml chicken stock
• 200gm shredded chicken meat
• 1 packet rice noodles (today I used 1 of the 2 packets that are in Kan-Tong rice noodles)
• bean sprouts
• 2-3 shallots
• handful each of basil and coriander (you could also use mint, Vietnamese mint, Thai basil, but this was what I had)
• sriracha chilli sauce
• hoisin sauce
• 1/2 lime

Heat the stock in a saucepan until it comes to the boil. 

Cook the rice noodles according to the packet. 

To assemble, put the noodles in the bottom of the bowl, add the chicken, then add the bean sprouts. Pour over hot stock. Add the shallots, herbs, sauces and lime juice to taste. 

Eat! Preferably without burning your tongue or splashing it all over yourself... *

What are your favourite soups? 

* disclaimer - I may or may not have done both of these...

Mmmmm soup. [post sponsored by La Zuppa]

I've been a bit AWOL lately due to the juggle of work, uni and OUR KITCHEN RENO!! Yes, the Kitchen Reno [the uppercase IS deliberate :) ] is now about 98% finished! But more about that in another post. When it's 100% completed and I've packed away all the bench clutter.

Bench top clutter. And a sneak peek of colours :)

Some of you know that for a few days of this reno we had to live in our basement as most of the timber floors that cover all of our upstairs had to be re-polished. Talk about a major PITA. But so worth it.

So for 5 days we lived on food that could be cooked in the microwave or in a toaster [silly me forgot to take the thermomix downstairs...]. Let me tell you how sick I am of BBQ chicken and toast.

What I'm not sick of however, is soup. Especially as it's now getting colder. And I am SO GRATEFUL to the beautiful people at La Zuppa who sent me a big box of microwavable soup, which arrived a few days before our basement foray. Talk about perfect timing!

Those of you who know me, know how much I generally loathe pre-packaged foods. For so many reasons, but mainly the preservatives and additives they contain [and the resultant, horrifying effect they have on my mood and general mental state :( ]. So when I was asked to trial La Zuppa my first instinct was to say "no way Jose". Until they told me their soup doesn't contain any additives. They are also gluten free, diary free, 99% fat free and most are under 150 calories per serve.  I thought I would give them a go.

They are ridiculously easy to heat up [2 minutes in the microwave] as they come in their own bowl that you cook and eat out of [although I do prefer mine transferred to a bowl once cooked...]. Perfect for work or for those quick meals when it's cold and you're starving! Or for when you are living out of your basement during a Kitchen Reno!

To heat: remove lid, peel off the foil, replace lid, zap for 2 minutes. EASY!

It comes in 10 flavours - my favourite was chicken and corn.

What is your favourite soup? Enter the La Zuppa facebook competition [closing 31 July 2012], tell them your favourite soup flavour and you could win a trip to Italy's spectacular Amalfi Coast to hone your culinary skills at the La Cucina Del Gusto cooking school. Or you could win one of the weekly cash prizes.

And don't forget to let me know your favourite flavour too!

P.S. The pics were taken on our new benchtops - the colour is shitake. Of course!