Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup

This was originally a Sandra Lee recipe that I have tweeked to make my own. It is way easy and everyone always loves it when I make it. You can easily make a larger batch if you need to feed a crowd, or just want more left overs.

3 chicken breasts or a store bought roasted chicken

1 pack onion soup mix

2 cups diced carrots

2 leeks diced

1 box chicken stock

2 cans cream of mushroom soup

1 T fines herbs (mix of parsley, chives, chervil & tarragon)

salt and pepper

1 package Grandmas Egg Noodles

Put chicken breasts in crock pot and sprinkle onion soup mix over top and add a couple cups of water and cook on low for 8 hours. Once chicken is cooked take it out and shred it into large chunks. If you used a store bought roasted chicken you can skip this first part and just shred the chicken. Save the liquid that is left in the crock pot. In a large pot add box of chicken stock and liquid left over from cooking the chicken, carrots & leeks, make sure you wash the leeks good they hold a lot of dirt in them, boil until the carrots are soft. You can also use less leeks and add some onion and celery if you want. Once carrots are soft add cream of mushroom soup and fines herb and shredded chicken. Boil the noodles in a separate pot otherwise they will soak up all the liquid in the soup, and then add the to the soup and taste of salt and pepper. You can use any kind of noodles but the Grandmas Egg Noodles taste home made, they are in the frozen food section and are in a red and yellow package, they can be a little tricky to find sometimes but they are totally worth it if you can find them, I stock up when I see them. If the soup seems to thick after you add the noodles you can add water or more chicken stock until it is the consistency you like.

Pumpkin Turkey Chili

Dawnie, this is for you. Hopefully it will re energize your will to blog!! You were having lots of fun doing it, and I am sure there are some things that you'd like to share. So, PLEASE!! BLOG!!!

That being said.

Here is an odd sort of recipe that I found in a Smith's mailer. I wanted to try it because I like recipes that hide healthy ingredients.

As always I also changed the recipe a ton based on what I like and what I had. I am only going to post what I did and not the original recipe.

1 Onion chopped
2 Bell peppers chopped (I only had red)
1 tbs Minced garlic
1 lb Ground turkey
2 C. Diced tomatoes (fresh or canned)
2 C. Pumpkin puree
1 can Kidney beans
1 can Pinto beans
1 1/2 tbs Chili powder
1 tbs Cumin
1/2 tbs Paprika
1/2 tsp each Black pepper & Salt
Toppings:
Shredded cheese
Sour Cream
Hot sauce

Brown ground turkey and set aside. In same pan add peppers & onion. Cook until tender, if using fresh tomatoes add them at this time too. Add garlic and spices. Return turkey to pan and add canned beans and pumpkin puree. Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer until its as thick as you like it. I like really thick chili so I let it simmer for a while. The original recipe called for 4 hrs in a crock pot, so that's also an option .

Top with your favorite toppings and try to get your family to guess the secret ingredient. No one will guess there is pumpkin in it. It makes gives the chili a beautifully creamy texture.

Cheesy Chicken Potato Soup

So, I am trying to get back into doing the house-wife duties... Having a little trouble, 5 out of 7 of the meals I made this week were NASTY! But I did make some really yummy soup, its so darn cold here all I can think about is hot chocolate and warm soup. Most the time I want to wear my coat and gloves in the house! I don't think Rikard mentioned this when he asked me to move to this country, its just not right...How cold it is!

Anyway onto the recipe!


Ingredients:
 - 4 medium potatoes diced
- 1 qt. Chicken broth (you can use water, I just like the richness of the broth)
- Butter (as much as you want... I prefer at least a stick)
- 4 Tbs. Flour
- 1 Cup Milk
- 1 1/2 Cup shredded cheese (We don't have orange cheese here in this country so I used a pizza mix so what ever you have in the fridge)
- 1 Onion Diced really small
- 2 Sticks Celery
- Paprika
- Salt and Pepper
- Chopped Chives

Directions:

- Boil the potatoes in the chicken broth until tender, don’t drain.
- In frying pan cook onions, celery and butter until soft.
    -Add flour and mix
    -Add milk and stir until it thickens and remove from heat.
    -Stir into the potatoes and broth.
    -Add shredded chicken.
- Season with paprika, salt, pepper, and season salt.


I added ½ cup of sour cream just to make it a little creamier. Rikard says it’s the best he has ever had… and really simple. By now I am sure he is getting sick of all my soups but I am tackling Chicken noodle tomorrow! YUM!

Love,



Dawnie