Hey everybody! It's Rosie here, reporting that I am alive and, well let's leave it at alive, shall we?
My husband and I rang in our first New Year married in style. And by in style I mean laid up on our couch, hand in hand, under layers and layers of blankies, watching the ball drop. We were determined to make it to midnight.
So, we both got the flu. And as awful as it has been, I am finally on the mend. At the ripe age of 30, i have gotten sick many times without my parents to take care of me, however this time, with the both of us sick, and seeing as it has lasted 8 days as of today, I had a few new experiences taking care of myself. First of all, cooking and cleaning up after myself when I am sick is the worst. Specifically, the two times I stood over my sink washing dishes, for the 3 minutes at a time that I could handle doing so, was atrocious. Seriously, there should be a law against having to do dishes when sick, or a service that you can hire that come in dressed in gas masks and clean suits to keep house for you.
Doing the dishes, wasn't much worse that having to cook for myself, because on about day 5 I declared that I could not, would not eat another can of chicken noodle soup for as long as I live (or the next 6 months). So i decided I would push through the pain, and make some chicken noodle soup. However, I knew I needed to work smarter, not harder, and do as little of the work as possible. So I bought a rotisserie chicken, used stock, and utilized my amazing food processor to do the chopping for me.
INGREDIENTS
1 rotisserie chicken
1 onion
1 bunch celery
A few carrots
4 cloves of garlic
10 cups low sodium chicken broth
(I used better than boullion, comes in a little jar)
1 package egg noodles
(they didn't make the group photo, but I used No Yolks)
olive oil
salt and pepper
(I always use Natures seasoning salt instead of table salt)
AND THEN FOR THE DOING:
Start by chopping all your veg. I did this in my food processor, it took all of 5 minutes.
I processed the carrots first, and got them cooking, because they are the hardest and take the longest to soften. I transferred the chopped carrots into a large cast iron skillet that I had warmed about 2 tablespoons of olive oil in. I prefer a cast iron skillet for sweating vegetables, but any skillet or pan will do.
Then I processed the onion, added it to the skillet. and then the celery. I processed each vegetable separately because I wanted different sizes for each.
I let these cook, over med-hi while stirring occasionally for about 10-15 minutes.
During this time I took a break, and rested. Then I got up and started adding the broth to my crock pot, and when the veggies were ready I added them to the broth. Then I added the chicken, and let it all simmer together, on low, for a few hours. I like to let the flavors mingle.
I forgot to take a picture at this step, but give me a break, I am sick, and new to this food blogging thing!
When I was ready to eat dinner, I added the egg noodles directly to the crock pot and let them cook for about 30 minutes. Then I tasted the soup and added salt and pepper to taste.
We devoured our soup with a few saltines, and it made us feel so much better!
OK, just a little better, but any improvement at that point was happily accepted.
Cough Cough,
Cough Cough,
