Gut Healing Homemade Chicken Soup

Chicken soup is well known for its healing benefits. It’s nourishing for the body and the soul!

When made correctly, it contains gut-healing properties that can help when we are sick and prevent us from getting sick.

You can make chicken soup in many different ways. We’ve shared one tried-and-true method below. The most important part is the meat stock or broth you create from cooking the whole chicken.

We’ve shared our meat stock recipes here in the past. You can prepare this and keep some in the freezer to quickly cook healing soup.

The method we’ve shared below gives more bang for your buck as you use the whole chicken, not just the bones or wings. This way, you get the broth, the meat, and the potential so that you can make another broth with the leftover bones.

You can adjust the recipe to your liking. If you don’t like garlic or onion, leave them out and flavour with herbs you know are okay for your gut. This option is gluten-free; however, you can use pasta to bulk it up to make it go a little further. In the past, I’ve also added potatoes or cannelloni beans to make the soup a little harder for dinner time.

We’ve added ginger and Turmeric to this recipe for their immune system and anti-inflammatory benefits. This can be great for an irritated, inflamed gut. You can play around with adding different herbs and spices that you have on hand.

Gluten-Free - Gut Healing Homemade Soup Recipe

Broth Ingredients:

1 whole chicken

1 head of garlic

2 carrots

2 stalks celery

2 bay leaves

5 black peppercorns

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

Enough filleted water to cover the chicken

Soup Ingredients:

Olive oil

1 onion diced

4 garlic cloves

2 carrots, diced

2 celery stalks diced

1 tablespoon freshly grated ginger

1 tablespoon freshly grated turmeric or 1 teaspoon ground

4 sprigs of thyme or 1 teaspoon thyme leaves

1/2 cup frozen peas

1 can of corn kernels.

1 pack of rice noodles

Salt and pepper

finely chopped parsley to garnish

How to make:

1. Add broth ingredients to a large pot and water to cover the chicken. Bring water to a simmer, scoop off any scum and allow to simmer for 1.5 hours or until chicken comes easily off the bone. You want to leave the lid on or slightly ajar to avoid losing the liquid. You can also do this step in your slow cooker by cooking for 8 hours on low while at work.

2. Once the chicken is cooked, remove it from the pot and place it on a pan or plate so you can shred your meat. DO NOT DISCARD THE BROTH—this is the best part and where all the healing benefits are. Shred your meat into bite-sized pieces. You can discard the bones or put them in the freezer to make bone broth at another time.

3. Remove the other vegetables from your broth, leaving only the liquid broth. You can use a strainer; ensure you have a pot underneath to capture the broth.

4. Heat oil in a large pot over the stove. Add onions and garlic and cook for 2 minutes. Then add carrots and celery and cook for another 2 minutes. Add Turmeric and ginger and mix to coat the vegetables. Cook for another 2 minutes.

5. Pour in your broth and mix, moving your wooden spoon across the bottom of the pot to lift any flavour that has stuck. Add the thyme and any other herbs you want to add. Bring to a simmer, then add your shredded chicken, peas and corn. Add as much chicken as you like. If you like a hearty soup, add more, but remember we are adding rice noodles too. You can keep extra chicken for lunches during the week or another dinner or add it to an omelette for breakfast. Season to taste with salt and pepper

6. Cook your rice noodles as per the packet directions. 

7. To serve, add a portion of rice noodles to the bowl and then ladle on your soup. Garnish with salt, pepper, and parsley. I don’t like adding rice noodles to the soup as they soak up all the liquid.