Homemade chicken soup

We are really blessed here in Sydney with the easiest winter one can wish for. Temperature hardly drops below ten degrees and the sky is most often blue. That's quite spectacular for someone like me who comes from the Northern Hemisphere were it's either grey in grey in winter or below zero, which sometimes leads to snow.

Funnily enough, it feels colder inside the house than outside. In fact I am sitting here, rugged up in blanket and getting cold feet and hands while typing and waiting for my chicken soup to warm up that I made yesterday. It's one of the best dishes in winter, warming and nurturing. I also add small pasta in shapes of letters and numbers to the soup. Childhood memory, in Germany we actually call this kind of soup "Buchstabensuppe" (letter soup) and that way it becomes a favourite meal for kids.

Here is my recipe for the chicken soup or Buchstabensuppe:

For the stock:

1 whole free range chicken (about 1.6kg)
 2 whole cloves

1 onion, peeled and halved
2 stalks celery, roughly chopped
1 carrot, sliced
1 bay leaf
2 stalks parsley 

For the soup:
3 corn on the cobs, husk removed and trimmed

3 carrots, diced
200 g small pasta

100 g sugar snap peas

For the stock, rinse the chicken thoroughly and remove any excess fat. Place into a large saucepan and add enough water to cover. Bring to the boil, skimming off any scum that floats on the surface. Push cloves into onion. Add vegetables and herbs, reduce heat and simmer gently for 1 hour.
Remove chicken and set aside to cool. Strain stock and discard vegetables. Chill stock and when cold remove any fat from surface. Remove and discard skin and bones from chicken. Shred meat. 

For the soup, return stock to a large saucepan and bring to the boil. Add the corn and carrots and cook for 15-20 minutes, or until cooked. Remove corn and let cool a little. Meanwhile, cook the and pasta and shredded chicken and cook for a further 5 minutes until pasta is just cooked. Cut away the corn kernels from the stem and add the kernels to the soup. Season well with salt and pepper and a little lemon juice.