Pasture Raised Chicken Soup with Ginger, Kombu and Herbs
Warming, delicious, ethically pasture raised chicken soup with an array of deeply nutrient dense herbs, greens, and sea vegetables that will go easy on your digestion and support the gut microbiome. Inspired by a family heirloom recipe. Just like your grandma's recipes, this TCM inspired soup will hit the spot!
Add the garlic, ginger, turmeric, chili flakes, thyme, and rosemary. Stir until fragrant, about 30 seconds.
Carefully add the whole chicken, kombu pieces and apple cider vinegar, then fill the pot to cover the chicken as much as you can with filtered or spring water. Bring the water to a full boil for 10 minutes, cover with a lid, then lower to a simmer for 90-120 minutes.
After 90 minutes, the chicken should be just about cooked. Carefully remove the chicken and place it on a tray to the side. Add the cabbage, bok choy, parsley and goji berries to the pot (or your choice of veggies), then stir and increase the heat to medium until it begins to simmer and the greens melt into the soup. In a small bowl using a fork, stir 2 tsp miso with 2 tsp apple cider vinegar until it turns into a runny paste, and set aside.
As the soup simmers, remove chicken from the bones and shred all meat off of the chicken using your hands. Save the bones for making a separate broth in another recipe, or discard. Add the shreds back into the soup to simmer (the darker meat should be brown and not pink). The greens should now be cooked. Remove from heat and stir in the miso and apple cider vinegar paste.
Season the soup generously with sea salt and pepper. Serve hot with freshly squeezed lemon juice and extra parsley and/or thyme.
Notes
The splash of apple cider vinegar helps draw the beneficial minerals out of the chicken bones. This is a common practice with bone broths in general.
Boil and simmer the soup containing the bones thoroughly! You can even extend the recommended simmering time to 120 minutes or more! A diet full of solely muscle meats is a long term recipe for disaster, so make sure to mix it up with bone broth, organs and other parts of the animal over time for the most balanced nutritional profile.
Mix it up! You can freely choose whatever veggies you can access or are in season! I recommend using at least one sea vegetable and one land vegetable.
You can stir in 2 tsp organic miso paste towards the end as the soup simmers for an extra umami flavour dimension and probiotic dose.
As usual, replace or omit any ingredients you don't get on with.
To make this in a slow cooker, place all ingredients in the vessel, cover with spring water and a splash of raw apple cider vinegar to draw the minerals from the bones, and cook 10-12 hours (or overnight) so the broth becomes nice and gelatinous when cooled (this is a sure sign of a successful, nutrient-dense broth).
If you are undermethylating, you can make a low histamine meat broth, such as this one.