Chicken Soup

My mom often made us chicken soup when we were growing up. It was one of my favorite meals. The other nice thing is that you can make a lot of it at once and keep it in the fridge for later. My mom always made it after we cooked a whole chicken up, so she would actually use the chicken bones and leftovers to make the broth. Since I don't make whole chickens at this point in my life, I just use chicken breasts and bouillon cubes. The other nice thing is that you can put whatever veggies you want in it. Since Gary is a little picky, I just stick to the following:

Chicken Soup - 400 calories for a large bowl

• 10 cups of water
• 10 chicken bouillon cubes (or enough for 10 cups)
• 2 tbsp of flour (or more depending on how thik you want the soup)
• salt and pepper to taste
  
• 2 cups chopped carrots
• 3 chopped celery stalks
• 4 peeled and chopped potatoes
• 1 can of corn
• 3 cooked chicken breasts

Boil water in a large pot (I use a stock pot). Add chicken bouillon and stir to dissolve. Decrease heat to a simmer. Sift flour gradually into broth while stirring. This will keep it from getting lumpy (just like making gravy). Add salt and pepper. Add veggies and let them simmer in the broth for at least a half hour. Shred or chop chicken into small pieces (I actually pick it apart with my fingers). Add chicken and corn to soup. You can add the chicken right away if you have it ready, I just usually cook and shred it while the veggies are cooking. Let the soup simmer for 5 or 10 more minutes.

You can substitute or add different veggies. My mom would often put squash in with it (Gary doesn't like squash though). It is very easy and yummy. It is also fairly low calorie. You can easily add to the amount of the soup too, just make some extra broth and throw some extra veggies in. You can also decrease it if you don't want leftovers.

I'm not sure how many of you would like me to keep posting recipes. It would encourage me to post more if I got some comments, otherwise I'll probably assume nobody cares. I hope some of you out there will like this.