“Never Buy Canned Soup” Chicken Noodle Soup

This was one of the very first recipes I perfected. It is incredibly easy to do – an quite honestly could be done on a weeknight if you are organized and have a solid hour! There is so much versatility to this dish and can be amped up or tailored down depending on what you are wanting!

Let’s try something – walk into your kitchen and open up your pantry. I’m sure you have a can of your favorite Chicken Noodle Soup, right? Ok – now look at the ingredients. Sure, it contains the basics: chicken, herbs, carrots, celery… but what’s all this?

Contains Less than 2% of: Modified Food Starch, Corn Protein (Hydrolyzed), Water, Chicken Fat, Potassium Chloride, Egg White (Dried), Carrot Puree, Sugar, Soy Protein Isolate, Sodium Phosphate, Tomato Extract, Maltodextrin, Spice, Beta Carotene (Color), Flavoring.

Can you honestly tell me you know what ALL of that is? Why is there additional coloring? What is wrong with the natural color of the soup? What is this mysterious “flavoring”? Weird!

Here’s my infomercial pitch to you:

What if I told you, you could make an incredibly delicious, hearty, filling soup with just 8 TOTAL ingredients + spices?

When chicken noodle soup is this simple, why would you buy it?! Seriously – it is SO easy. I’ll show ya, scroll down!

There is so much I do in my day to day or week to week that makes throwing this dish together even easier!

One thing I do is almost always have frozen sliced carrots and celery on hand. I like to buy in bulk, spend a few hours washing, slicing, packing, and freezing. Then, when I want something like this, I can take out the pre-measured packages of veggies from the freezer. That is one way to make this dish even easier!

Additionally, I love to buy whole rotisserie chickens. I’ll shred that meat and freeze it. It is perfect in a dish like this.

Lastly, I always have jars of frozen, homemade chicken stock in the freezer. You know that rotisserie chicken I mentioned? Well, it gave its’ life to us, so I like to use as much as possible. And all those veggie scraps from processing? Yep! That becomes the base of a delicious homemade chicken broth. Throw a few jars into the pot and you have chicken noodle soup with ingredients you can prep and freeze in advance!

“Never Buy Canned” Chicken Noodle Soup

This was one of the very first recipes I perfected. It is incredibly easy to do – an quite honestly could be done on a weeknight if you are organized and have about an hour! When chicken noodle soup is this simple, why would you buy it?! Seriously – it is SO easy. I’ll show ya, scroll down!

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Prep Time 15 minutes mins

Cook Time 30 minutes mins

Total Time 45 minutes mins

Ingredients

  

• 2-3 cups of cooked chicken diced
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1/2 onion diced approx. 1/2-3/4 cup
• 2 cloves garlic minced
• 6 cups chicken broth
• 10 stalks celery diced
• 6 whole carrots diced
• Egg noodles
• 1/2 tsp dill thyme, oregano, salt, pepper*

Instructions

 

• Begin by heating olive oil in a heavy pot (I love to use a dutch oven!)
• Add diced onion and cook until translucent. Add garlic and cook additional 15 seconds until fragrant.
• Add celery, carrots, shredded or diced chicken, chicken broth, and spices. Bring to a boil.
• Turn down and simmer until veggies are tender (approx. 20 minutes)
• Add noodles and allow to cook a few minutes until soft.
• Enjoy with some warm bread for a comforting meal!

Notes

Tip 1: If you want to have lots of leftovers, boil noodles separately so you can save or freeze the soup and heat up when needed without having the soggy noodles.
Tip 2: To get the pinkish hue of broth pictured above, try adding some purple carrots to your soup.
Tip 3*: These are the BASICS to create the traditional flavors of chicken noodle soup. But this is YOUR soup, play around with flavors. What about some squeezed lemon juice? Or maybe a sprig of Rosemary? Or – even give it a kick with some cajun-style seasonings for a different twist.