Hearty Homemade Chicken Soup

In the midst of this wretched cold weather, only a few things can make the lack of feeling in the fingertips and a runny nose seem like a good thing; homemade chicken soup!
This recipe is great because there are so many ways to tweak it to fit your tastes.  If you want to add bay leaves, add them!  Pre-made chicken broth? Go ahead! (But be warned, you probably won’t get the same tasty results). Either way, this recipe is fun, easy and positively delicious!

DISCLAIMER: Pictures are not as clear due to the fact that I had to use a laptop webcam, I apologize.

Ingredients:

– 1 whole chicken
– 6 long carrots (you can use baby carrots)
– 1 stalk celery
– 1 onion
– 1 bag Lipton chicken noodle soup
– 3 zucchini
– 1 cinnamon stick (2 tbs cinnamon powder will do)
– 2 tbs salt
– 1 tbs pepper
– Water

Steps:


1. Wash the chicken thoroughly and place it in a large pot
2. Cut the onion in half and place over the chicken along with cinnamon, Lipton Chicken Noodle Soup packet, salt, and pepper
3. Fill 3/4 of the pot with water
4. Cook on medium heat for 45 minutes
5. Thoroughly wash carrots, celery, zucchini (scrub zucchini with a vegetable brush to remove sand
6. Cut off the ends of each vegetable

7. Dice the vegetable in bite-size pieces and layer them in a bowl in this order: zucchini on the bottom, then celery, then carrots. (This is so that you can put each vegetable in at a time.  They require different times to cook). Set aside

8. Remove the chicken from the pot and let it cool off on a large baking sheet
9. Strain the broth into another pot to remove excess onion, chicken pieces
10. Strip the chicken of the meat and shred them into thick chunks. Set aside

11. Carefully add the carrots and let them cook for five minutes, then add the rest of the vegetables
12. Let the soup cook on a medium-low heat so that it simmers for another fifteen minutes without the vegetables getting too soft.