Good For the Soul

Since I have been sick this past week I have been making soup for days now, and today I changed my method. Today I baked the chicken with a little olive oil and salt and pepper, then cut it up and poured the juice in a pan. I then minced onion and threw it in the pan and turned on the heat. Once the onion was translucent I poured in some vegetable broth that I accidentally grabbed when I grabbed a chicken broth form the pantry. I brought that to a boil and added some shredded carrot (don't like big chunks of carrot in my soup) and some big egg noodles. Yum!

This was probably the best method I've had as I've been boiling the chicken in the broth. Roasting it seemed to improve the chicken taste and texture. Next time though I'm going to roast the vegetables with the chicken.

Mmm, Mmm, Good

What can I say? I love soup. Amy's Organic is my favorite tomato soup. I threw some croutons on top, but some fresh shredded Parmesan would have been even better. That and a grilled cheese sandwich!

Go out and buy some of Amy's soup at your local Whole Foods! Yes, this post is a shameless plug!

I'm Back In the Kitchen Again!

When I got home from Korea I was so jet-lagged. My internal clock was way off. Sleeping at a decent local time was basically impossible, and the times I was hungry was usually at midnight!

My first night home I stayed up until about 2 am, and around 11:30 pm or midnight I was ravished. I hadn't shopped at all so I had to dig into my pantry to find something yummy. Well you can't go wrong with lentils. I made the base and then kept eating it (for the next two days) in different variations. I'd add noodles, more jarred tomato sauce, and thin it out for soup. Yum!

Midnight Lentils

1 quart box chicken broth (I use the low sodium)
1/2 jar of your favorite spaghetti sauce (I used garlic lovers)
1/2 cup dried lentils (be sure to sort out any stones, rinse and drain)
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1/2 tsp dried oregano
fresh cracked pepper and kosher salt to taste (the lentils will absorb the salt so you may want to add more later)

In my small pressure cooker pan I added the chicken broth, sauce, and the lentils and brought it to a boil. I then covered and sealed it and boiled until I achieved the correct pressure. Read your pressure cooker instructions. I just listen for a gentle hiss. After the hiss is audible I then turned the heat down to low and cooked for 20 minutes.

The lentils were creamy and the soup was thick. I mashed some of the lentils up with my potato masher and delve into a huge steaming bowl. Talk about good stuff!