Chicken Soup with Roasted Vegetables
current situation: chicken soup with roasted vegetables
Four whole chickens cost me twenty dollars. That is twelve big bowls, and I have done the maths more than once because it still does not look right: $1.66 a bowl. Do it.
The broth is not about the chicken. It is about the feet. They are the cheapest thing in the case, nobody wants them, and they are more or less pure collagen — which is what turns thin yellow liquid into something that sets like jelly overnight in the fridge. If it wobbles when you knock the bowl in the morning, you did it right.
Everything else goes in soft. The potato, the onion and the garlic poach in the broth until they are translucent and would fall apart if you looked at them wrong — no browning, no caramelising, nothing crisp. The only roasted things are the peppers. And the beetroot is cooked on its own and dropped in at the very end, because a beet that simmers with the rest of it turns the whole pot pink and you lose the gold.
Everyone invited. Bring a bowl.
- Makes
- About 12 big bowls
- Hands-on
- About an hour
- On the stove
- 4–6 hours
- Start
- The day before
What you need
The stock — the day before
- 2 whole chickens, about 4 lb each, jointed — backs, wings and tips for the pot, the good pieces kept back
- 1 lb chicken feet — the whole point, ask the butcher
- 2 large onions, halved, skins left on
- 4 carrots, snapped in half
- 1 head of celery, leaves and all
- 2 heads of garlic, cut across the middle
- 1 tbsp black peppercorns
- 3 bay leaves
- Cold water to cover — about 8 quarts
Poached soft in the broth
- The chicken pieces you kept back — thighs, breasts, drumsticks, skin on
- 2 lb Yukon Gold potatoes, big rough chunks, skin left on
- 3 onions, cut into thick wedges so they hold together
- 2 heads of garlic, cloves separated, peeled, left whole
- Plenty of coarse cracked black pepper
In at the end
- 3 red bell peppers, roasted, peeled and torn into wide strips — or a good jar of them
- 3 medium beetroot, cooked separately, cut into thick rounds
- Salt — more than you think, it is a lot of liquid
- A splash of cider vinegar
How it goes
1 — Roast the feet
Spread the chicken feet on a parchment-lined sheet pan and roast at 400°F for 25 minutes, until they take some colour. Not strictly necessary, but it is the difference between a pale yellow broth and a proper gold one.
pro tip — Chicken feet are extremely cheap and yield fantastic bone broth. That is the whole secret of this soup and it costs about three dollars.
2 — Joint the birds and keep the good pieces back
Backs, wings, wing tips and trim go in the stockpot. Thighs, breasts and drumsticks go in the fridge — they are not stock, they are the chicken you actually eat, and they get poached gently at the end so they stay whole with the skin on.
3 — Everything in the pot, cold water over it
Carcasses, roasted feet, onions, carrots, celery, garlic, peppercorns and bay. Cover with cold water — cold, not hot, so the fat renders out slowly instead of emulsifying into the broth and clouding it.
4 — Barely a simmer, four to six hours
Bring it up slowly, then hold it where a bubble breaks the surface every second or two. Skim the grey foam for the first twenty minutes, then leave it alone. Top up if the bones ever show above the water.
pro tip — A rolling boil is what makes cloudy stock, and this soup is clear in the bowl or it is nothing. If the surface is really moving, the heat is too high.
5 — Strain it and chill it overnight
Strain through a sieve into whatever fits in your fridge. Let it go cold uncovered, then cover it. Do not skip the night — it is how the fat comes off, and it is how you find out whether it worked.
pro tip — In the morning it should be set like jelly and hold the shape of the bowl. That is the collagen from the feet. If it is liquid it will still taste good; next time, more feet and less water.
6 — Lift the fat and keep it
There will be a pale cap of schmaltz across the top. Lift it off in one piece and put it in a jar. You are not using it here, but it is better than any oil you own and it keeps for weeks.
7 — Roast the peppers, cook the beets apart
Blacken the peppers whole over a flame or under the broiler, bag them for ten minutes, then slip the skins off and tear them into wide strips. Cook the beetroot separately — wrapped in foil in the oven, or simmered in its own pan — and cut it into thick rounds.
pro tip — The beets go in their own pan for one reason: a beet cooked with the rest of it bleeds, and you lose the gold you spent a day building. Kept apart, it sits dark red in clear amber, which is the whole look of this bowl.
8 — Poach the vegetables soft
Bring the stock to a gentle simmer and add the potato, the onion wedges and the whole peeled garlic cloves. Twenty-five minutes, until the potato is completely tender and going translucent at the edges and the onion has gone soft and glassy. You are not after bite. Everything in this bowl is soft.
9 — Then the chicken, gently
Season the reserved pieces hard with coarse cracked pepper and lower them into the simmering broth, skin up. Fifteen to twenty minutes, barely moving, until just cooked through. They stay whole and the skin stays on — you lift a piece into the bowl with the ladle, you do not shred it.
10 — Peppers and beets last, off the heat
Fold in the roasted pepper strips, lay the beetroot rounds on top, and take it off the heat. Salt it properly — it will take more than you expect — and a splash of cider vinegar right at the end to lift the whole thing.
Twelve bowls. Call somebody. You are not getting through that on your own. LFG.