A rich stock makes a delicious and nourishing base for soup.
Ingredients:
- Chicken, with meat on the bone, whole, half or parts, the bones or carcass from a roasted chicken bring very rich flavor, a whole chicken makes a large pot of a full flavored broth with plenty of tasty meat to eat
- Garlic with the skin on
- 1-2 good sized onions, skin on, quartered
- 2 or 3 carrots, chopped
- 2 or 3 celery leafy ends and ribs
- Black pepper corns
- Bay leaves 3-4
- Pure cold water
Put on your aprons.
Wash the chicken, put it in the pot.
Scrub the carrots with a brush and wash the celery
Keep the skins on the onions and garlic, they impart color and flavor
Little ones can use the two handed chopper with the julienne blade, like this
Chop, chop
Choppity chop.
Cut off the bottom
And cut off the top.
What we have left,
We’ll put in the pot.
Chop, chop
Choppity, chop.
Chop it up.
This verse reminds me of Ella Fitzgerald who brings swing to her choppity, chop, chop chopsticks, HERE for a little swing in your choppity chop chop moments!
Leave the skin on the onion and garlic.
Because I know it is going to boil and cook for a long time, I allow the children to really handle the food.
Put it all in a big pot with the chicken and cover with water.
Bring it to a boil, cover it, and let it simmer on low until the broth is golden and the meat falls off the bone with ease.
Do not stir. Stirring makes it cloudy.
Skim off any foam from the top. Not the fat. Just the foam.
This can be put in a crock pot and left to cook overnight or covered and left to cook for a few hours on the stove. The house will be imbued with homemade chicken soup smell and all the good feeling that comes with that for the entire day.
Tomorrow we make Morning Garden Soup with this stock, my recipe is here.
Tonight, soak one half cup barley in clear water overnight at room temperature. This helps make the grain more digestible.
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Lisa Boisvert Mackenzie is the Editor and Publisher of The Wonder of Childhood and has spent sixteen years with one of her own children in early childhood (under seven years of age.) She worked with children and their families for the past twenty four years, initially as a homebirth midwife. Lisa’s home based program The Children’s Garden began fourteen years ago on a remote tropical island in the Pacific Ocean. Lisa supports parents and homeschoolers as a teacher, group leader and consultant in parenting, homeschooling and bringing daily, weekly and seasonal rhythms to home life through the year with an Interactive Nursery/Kindergarten Curriculum Program, Celebrate the Rhythm of Life through the Year (or Rhythm of the Year for short.) She lives with her family in Northern New England. She blogs at Celebrate the Rhythm of Life and and hosts a discussion groups for parents of young children here.
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Thank you so much for this visual guide, it’s so helpful and makes it seem so simple. Just love the Chop, chop verse and the Sing Song Swing, we’ve begun making this soup rhythm part of our week. Ding dong ding!
I learned in my Nourishing Traditions class that if you cook the stock for 24 hours on low, you leach out all the beneficial teeth/ bone healing minerals, and gut healing gelatin.
great post! where did you get that sweet kid knife?
Hi Kat,
Here is one at amazon,
http://www.amazon.com/Vegetable-Crinkle-Cutter-French-Slicer/dp/B001UANLM8/
My first came as a hand me down from my grandmother, I liked it so much for the children who were not yet at ease with a regular knife that I went out bought more at a kitchen shop.