CHICKEN STEW
Chicken soup is associated with being a bit under the weather for good reason. It’s nutritious, tasty, filling and somehow seems just the thing for when, as Grandpa Joe would have put it, “a body is ailing a bit.” Curiously, I don’t remember Grandma Minnie ever making chicken soup or indeed soup of any kind, although her stews, laced with meat and vegetables swimming in gravy, were in essence just thickened soups. This recipe is similar to the manner in which she prepared chicken stew. She usually did so when there were a couple of leftover carcasses from baked hens served at holidays (we almost always had hens the family had grown as opposed to store-bought turkey) or when an old hen had been sufficiently derelict in her egg-laying duties to invite consumption. The stew made a great wintertime dish, especially when a heaping platter of cathead biscuits was served as a side.
- 1 whole baked hen or a turkey carcass with ample leftover meat scraps
- 1 large onion, peeled and quartered
- 4 ribs celery with leaves, chopped
- 1 large carrot, scrubbed and cut into chunks
- 2 whole cloves garlic
- 1 bay leaf
- Water to cover
Remove skin from the carcass. Place in a stock pot and surround with onion, celery, carrot, garlic and bay leaf. Cover with water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer, covered, for two hours. Refrigerate stock and remove fat which accumulates on the top. Remove all meat from bones and save.
- 8 cups stock (add canned chicken broth if needed)
- 2 cups milk
- 4 medium potatoes, peeled and diced
- 3 carrots, peeled and diced
- 3 ribs celery, diced
- 1 cup frozen or canned lima beans
- 2 ounces small shell pasta
- 2 cups fresh, chopped spinach
- 1 cup frozen green peas
- Meat from carcass
- ¼ cup fresh parsley
- ½ teaspoon dried basil
- 1 teaspoon fresh black pepper
- Salt to taste
- 1 cup evaporated milk
- 2 tablespoons flour mixed with 4 tablespoons water (optional if you want thicker stew)
Cook stock, milk, potatoes, carrots and celery for a half hour. Add lima beans, pasta, spinach, peas, meat, parsley, basil and pepper to the soup and cook an additional 20 minutes. Remove from heat, season with salt if necessary, and stir in evaporated milk. Return to low heat, stirring often. Do not let stew boil. Thicken with a flour and water paste if desired.
12 hearty servings
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In company with his late wife, Ann, Jim Casada wrote a number of cookbooks focusing on game or foods from the wild. One of those, The Complete Venison Cookbook, is available from him or the Sporting Classics Store. Jim’s next book, Fishing for Chickens: A Smokies Food Memoir, is due out from the University of Georgia Press in mid-2022. He is currently taking advance reservations for copies now. To reserve a copy or learn more about his many other books, include his recent multi-award winning A Smoky Mountain Boyhood: Memories, Musings, and More, visit his website at www.jimcasadaoutdoors.com or e-mail him at jimcasada@comporium.net.
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