Winter is coming...and it's time for soup! I don't know why, but I keep thinking about Campbell's. Campbell's chicken noodle soup. I loved it when I was a young person, because it was one of those things I could "make" for myself. Sure, you opened up the can, dumped it into a pan and just heated it up. But, it felt so grown up. Sometimes, you would add milk instead of water to make a creamy soup. Other times, you loaded it so full of crackers that it soaked up all of the broth and you just ended up with this wet, starchy deliciousness. I want that soup.
As a vegetarian, I have eaten a lot of analog meatless products--both purchased and made--but I really like Beyond Meat Beyond Chicken. And they aren't paying me to say this with a year's supply of product or anything. It's simple and easy to use on pizza, in salad, with pasta and in tacos. So I was thinking, why not chicken noodle soup?
For my broth, I used a combination of chicken flavored vegetarian broth and a kombu dashi; added onion, carrots and celery; finally pasta rings, Beyond Meat and herbs. Simple, nourishing...and nostalgic. It was memory in a bowl.
Recipe: Chickenless Noodle Soup
- Three pieces kombu seaweed
- 1 small onion, finely diced
- 4 medium-sized carrots, peeled and thinly sliced
- 4 stalks of celery, trimmed, halved a thinly sliced
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 32-ounce container No-chicken broth
- 3-4 twigs of fresh thyme
- 1/2 pound small pasta Os, noodles, broken spaghetti, ditalini or even orzo
- Salt to taste
- 1 9-oz package Beyond Chicken, thawed enough to slice and shred
To make the dashi:
Rinse the kombu and wipe gently with a cloth, but not too much--the powdery coating is what helps add flavor to the dashi. Place in a saucepan with four cups of cold water; let stand for 15 minutes. Turn the heat to medium and slowly warm the water to just below boiling, about 10 minuts. Do not boil! Turn off the heat, remove the kombu and strain the dashi into a measuring cup.
To make the soup:
In a heavy stockpot or Dutch, combine the onion, carrots and celery with the olive oil and cook over medium heat for 10 minutes, until the vegetables begin to soften. Add the thyme, broth and dashi, then simmer for 20 minutes. Taste and adjust the seasoning. Remove the thyme twigs, but keep the leaves. Add the pasta and cook until it is tender, about 10 minutes.
Meanwhile, slice the Beyond Chicken lengthwise, then shred the pieces with your hand or a fork. Add to the soup and simmer until warm. Serve in large bowls with big spoons and saltine crackers.