Feel Better Soup

Unfortunately, this week I have found myself with a cold. I do my best to ignore every time I may be a little ill, but it doesn’t always work. I could drink 10 cups of emergen-c and this cold would still be around. So, I chose to just live with it. Since I was feeling icky I spent the day just hanging in my pjs, watching Orphan Black (thank you Ada Taylor for getting me addicted), and making feel better soup. I just made up the term feel better soup and ad libbed the recipe, but I thought I’d share it just in case anyone needs some culinary inspiration. I have always liked eating leftovers, but was once inspired by an episode of the Tyra Show that cooked leftovers in new dishes. So, now I do that all the time. I started this thinking I would just cook a can of chicken noodle and then take a nap, but only found chicken broth. What I ended up with was much better than chicken noodle so I have no regrets. I’m going to share my recipe with you all, but know that it is extremely flexible (I’m not a campbell’s ad or anything). 

The Recipe: 

1 can of chicken/beef/vegetable broth

1.5 cans of water (use the broth can to measure)

1 tbl olive oil

1 onion, chopped 

1 clove of garlic, minced

1 lemon

Your favorite hot sauce (I use Chalula)

A few stalks of parsley, minced

A few stalks of cilantro (unless you’re genetically predisposed to hate it), minced

Pepper (to taste)

Other preferred seasoning (I used something with Rosemary in it)

Any other vegetable you like and/or have leftover from something else

What I used: 

2 carrots

1/4 of a small red cabbage

leftover veggie kababs with red onion, bell pepper, squash, and mushrooms

leftover grilled brussel sprouts (cooked with lime soy sauce)

more mushrooms (fresh)

To Cook:

Put your broth and water into a pot, turn on low and add chopped carrots and cabbage (or whatever you want to cook in your broth the longest). Add your onions and garlic to a pan with a splash of olive oil, add cilantro, leftover veggies, and mushrooms, squeeze in half the lemon juice and sauté for a bit. When you’re satisfied with how your sauté mixture looks add it to the broth, add your parsley, the other half of the lemon juice, pepper, and all other preferred seasonings. Put a lid on your pot and cook for roughly 20 minutes (or however long you want to wait). Then eat and start feeling better!

The creative part of this recipe is that you can use it as a basis for making any soup ever. Which I guess is obvious, but also awesome. I’m super thankful I watched my dad make soup a million times and could make this in under an hour to feel better about fighting off this cold. 

Other than the bit of a cold, I have been having a great time home in Oklahoma. I’ll write a post about it soon so you can read all about it.