Homemade Chicken Soup

A few days ago I made homemade chicken noodle soup for our community group. It was such a hit that I

decided to type up the recipe and share it. This way, too, it's written down instead of just in my head, so I don't have to try to remember it!

The inspiration for this recipe is a kids' book called Noodle Soup by Gloria Repp, but I've modified the original quite a bit and made it my own.

Chicken Noodle Soup

Serves 12. Prep time: 5 hours. Cooking time: 45 minutes.

• 1 rotisserie chicken
• 2 onions, chopped
• 4 cloves garlic, finely grated
• 6 carrots, cut into 1/2 inch slices
• 3 stalks celery, cut into 1 inch slices
• 8 cups chicken stock
• 1 tablespoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 teaspoon dried basil
• 1/4 cup dried parsley
• 2 large or 4 small bay leaves
• 1 pound egg noodles
• 2 10.5 ounce cans cream of chicken soup

1. Separate chicken from skin and bones. Break chicken into bite-sized pieces. Reserve chicken.
2. In a large pot, cover skin and bones of chicken with water. Bring to a boil. Lower heat. Simmer 4 hours.
3. Strain out bones and skin and discard. Reserve liquid (stock) for soup. (Steps 1-3 can be done several days ahead of time.)
4. In a large stock pot, sweat out onions and garlic in several tablespoons of olive oil until onions are soft.
5. Add reserved stock from boiling the chicken bones. Add all remaining ingredients except noodles and cream of chicken.
6. Bring to a boil. Lower heat. Simmer 35 minutes or until carrots and celery are soft.
7. Add reserved chicken, egg noodles, and cream of chicken soup.
8. Bring to a boil. Lower heat. Simmer 10 minutes or until noodles are soft.
9. Remove bay leaves before serving.

Using Up The Leftover Turkey: Buffalo Turkey Dip

A few months ago, I bought the ingredients for a Buffalo Chicken Pull Apart Pizza to make for guests. But when the time came to make it, I was feeling lazy. So I left off the crust and mixed everything into a dip. The company loved it, and I decided I'd better write down the recipe. On this Thanksgiving weekend, I made the dip with leftover turkey, and it was a hit! 

So here is my recipe. 

Crockpot Buffalo Chicken (or Turkey) Dip

2 (10 oz) cans chicken, pulled

4 large cloves garlic, pressed or micro-planed

1 (12 oz) bottle Frank's Buffalo Hot sauce 

2 (8 oz) blocks cream cheese

1 (16 oz) bottle Ranch dressing

1 (8 oz) block cheddar cheese, shredded

1 cup sour cream

1.  Combine all ingredients. If too spicy, add more Ranch. 

2.  Cook in Crockpot on high for 1 1/2 hours. 

3.  Serve with chips. 

The Best Chocolate Chip Cookies You'll Ever Eat (Not Hyperbole, Fact!)

I must say that my favorite type of cookie is chocolate chip. My vision of the perfect chocolate chip cookie is one that is slightly crisp on the outside and chewy on the inside. (If you like hard, crunchy cookies like my sister does, then stop reading right now. Such heresy shall never grace the pages of my blog, so take your sweet tooth elsewhere!) The perfect cookie must have plenty of chocolate chips and a flavorful cookie base. I've kind of been on a quest to find this perfect recipe. Every time I made chocolate chip cookies I tried something new, but every recipe was missing something. Some were too crispy, some too doughy or cakey. And some had too much cookie and not enough chocolate! And all of them were lacking some specific taste that I just couldn't identify. (I'm not a chef or a foodie, so I've never been able to taste something and say, "This needs a touch more cumin." Not that you would put cumin in chocolate chip cookies, but you get my point!)

A Generation That Did Not Know God

And the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great work that the Lord had done for Israel. And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died at the age of 110 years. And they buried him within the boundaries of his inheritance in Timnath-heres, in the hill country of Ephraim, north of the mountain of Gaash. And all that generation also were gathered to their fathers. And there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel. (Judges 2:7-10)

I came across this passage in my Bible reading yesterday. (See this post I wrote about the plan I'm using this year.) As a mom, I think this has got to be one of the most sobering and saddening passages in the Bible. Think about it. The people of Israel were slaves in Egypt. Then God, by his own mighty hand and through incredible feats of power, delivered them. God's fame spread through all the known world. Then God led them through the desert. He provided them with food and water. And he gave them his law, so that they would know how to live. (They didn't have to use guesswork or trial and error to please him like the idol worshipers did with their gods.) He subdued nations before them. He even appeared to them in smoke and fire on Mount Sinai. And all through this time, he kept telling them to remember and pass down the stories of what he had done.

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. (Deuteronomy 6:4-9)

Eat This Book!

I was six when my mom started teaching me the importance of reading the Bible for myself every day. At first she gave me specific passages to read along with content and application questions to answer. Then she taught me to read through whole books and keep a notebook handy to write down what I learned. By age eight, I was using a Bible reading plan to read through the whole Bible, although I skipped over large sections of the prophets!

In high school I read the Bible through several more times, but somewhere along the line my reason for reading the Bible became simply to give myself a daily check mark on a mental list called "Things I Do to Please God" that made me a better Christian than others around me.