Quick Chicken Noodle Soup

It started with a sniffle, and then manifested into something far worse...a complete loss of voice. This is what I experienced over the holidays and I'm just now starting to feel more like myself.

From what I hear in the hallways  at work and amongst others in the area, this nasty bug has been hitting everybody. When you're sick, you often crave comfort food. For some people, that is the types of foods mom would make you when you were sick as a child. Peanut butter toast or grilled cheese were my go-tos. Nowadays, I tend to gravitate more to the exotic and I like to think that spicy food will cure what ails me most of the time. Unfortunately, when I was told I had a mild form of laryngitis, I was advised to avoid spicy foods and to focus on hot liquids and soups to nurse my way back to health.

When I'm not feeling well, the desire to cook anything that takes longer than 30 minutes is completely lost on me and when you don't have your mom around to make you that toast or soup, you have to cook through your Sudafed haze. So quick and easy is the way to go.

So I made the simplest, quickest soup I could come up with that included protein and vegetables: chicken noodle soup. Like most soups, this freezes well so I will continue to experience this soup's healing powers throughout this winter. But let's hope I don't need it!

Quick Chicken Noodle Soup (serves 6-8)

Ingredients:

• 1 lb. chicken thighs, diced 
• 2 TB olive oil
• 2 medium carrots, peeled and chopped
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 2 ribs celery, chopped
• 2 bay leaves, fresh or dried
• Salt and pepper
• 6 cups chicken stock 
• 1/2 lb. wide egg noodles

Directions:

Place a large pot over moderate heat and add olive oil. Add diced chicken thighs and cook for 5-6 minutes until the pink is gone. Remove from pot and set aside.

Add stock to the pot and bring to a boil. Add bay leaves to the pot. Then add carrots, onion and celery and cook for 5 minutes. Add salt and pepper.

Add diced chicken, return soup to a boil, and reduce heat back to moderate. Add the noodles and cook soup an additional 6 minutes or until noodles are tender and remove soup from the heat.

Remove bay leaves and serve with saltines, if you desire.