We have the serious case of the Post Christmas blahs over here. We are all sick and exhausted, so I decided to try this soup recipe that I have been wanting to try for a while. There is nothing like a pot of homemade soup on the stove to chase away the Holiday Hangover! This is a hearty chicken and rice soup that involves a lot of tomatoes – my fave. It’s from Joy McCarthey’s Joyous Health (so no surprise I love it so much!)

What you will need: 

• 16 cups chicken stock (I use my own) or organic low sodium store bought.
• 6 to 8 medium tomatoes or 2 cans store bought. (I’ve done this both way and using whole tomatoes is far, far better! Just takes a bit more time to prepare.. sorry!)
• 2 tbsp coconut oil or grape seed oil
• 1 medium onion, cut into pieces
• 2 cups of carrots chopped into bite sized pieces
• 1 cup celery chopped into bite sized pieces
• 3/4 cup brown rice
• 3/4 cup barley (you can skip this if you want to make this gluten free – I did!)
• Sea salt and pepper to taste
• Any herbs you may want – I used thyme, oregano and parsley
• 1 to 2 cups diced cooked chicken
  • Note: I made my chicken stock in the morning, and used the stock as the base for this soup, and kept the meat from the chicken legs for this recipe as well. This does make for a long day of cooking though so do it when you have time and are planning to be home all day. 

Instructions: 

• In a large pot, heat the chicken stock.
• Add tomatoes with their juice
• In a separate pot melt coconut oil and salute onion and garlic
• Add carrots and celery’ sauce for 4 more minutes
• Add sautéed vegetables, brown rice and barley (if using) back to the stock
• Season to taste with salt, pepper and herbs
• Simmer over medium heat for a few hours, until the veggies, brown rice and barley are fully cooked.
• Stir in cooked chicken, simmer until chicken is heated through (this is not really necessary if you aren’t eating right away).

I freeze this recipe in smaller jars for Olive, and large jars for the adults!

I never really believed in the healing properties of chicken soup, and just thought that it was all in people’s heads. That was until I was recently speaking to a nutritionist who made it clear to me just how incredibly gut healing stock is for anyone (which is why I try to get stock into Olive any way that I can!)