I’ve always been a soup lover. I know that’s not true of everyone, but I find them warming and comforting, and it’s a great way to ease your stomach into a meal if you’ve not eaten for a while. Every Ramadan, I make a big batch of soup once a week and it’s what I break my fast on.
Here’s my favourite in terms of goodness, flavour and satisfaction.
We’re going to start with making a homemade chicken stock, which we’ll then drain, shred the chicken and use the stock to cook the vegetables that will actually make up the soup. Pop them all in a pot, cover it with water and let it cook on a simmer for about two hours. Simple.
- A whole chicken
- Three onions, quartered
- Some leeks or celery chopped roughly
- Tops & tails of various vegetables*
- Three or four cloves of garlic
- Herb of choice (I used coriander)
- ~6 cups chicken stock**
- 2 portions spaghetti (I use spelt)
- Salt and pepper (or peppercorns, like I used)
- 1 tbsp chicken masala***
- In a pot, add one quartered onion, tops and tails of various vegetables, leeks or celery, garlic, peppercorns, and the chicken.
- Cover it with water and let it cook on a simmer for about two hours.
- Remove the chicken, and strain the rest of the contents through a colander, making sure to (obviously) collect the stock. Toss the vegetable remains.
- Shred your chicken ready for the next step of making the soup (if you don’t make the soup, you can use the shredded chicken for sandwiches or a pie filling, amongst many other things).
- Put the rest of the quartered onions, carrots, broccoli, and chicken into the pot and cook for about 35 minutes.
- After 35 munutes, add in your pasta and let that cook for about 10 minutes. Don’t overcook it, you don’t want it to melt into the rest of the soup.
I know that dishes like this can be daunting at times, because overall they take so much time. But so little of that time needs you to be actively cooking or prepping, which means it’s actually a really fantastic dish to meal prep or get ready for a nice dinner. It’s also so good for you! Lots of vegetables, the good parts of chicken coming from the stock rather than simply consuming chicken breast. All round win.
There you go! I always batch-make it, as I said, so doing it once a week doesn’t feel like too much work. Give a go, and let me know what you think! Any questions, pop them in a comment below.
As always, bilafiya!
(well wishes and wellbeing)
Sand Kitchen 
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