Simple Ingredients Cooked Lovingly
Eating soup always has a warming, calming effect and, psychologically, makes us feel healthier. The best soups are the ones cooked from scratch using as many fresh ingredients as possible. This Warming Chicken Soup with Chilli Oil takes inspiration from traditional Asian chicken soup recipes, where the focus is on taking time to create a rich, fatty, flavoursome stock, then adding just a handful of other fresh ingredients.
Homemade Instant Chilli Oil
As chilli oil is an important part of Asian cuisine, having a jar on hand for drizzling over noodles, ramen, fried eggs or anything else you fancy is an absolute must. Naturally, plenty of shop-bought versions are available, but making your own is so simple and you have the added bonus of customising the ingredients to suit your taste (see recipe notes).
Making The Best Chicken Soup Stock
Chicken stock is a kind of art form, with some Japanese ramen chefs cooking broths for up to 24 hours. They hold flavour secrets tightly to their chest, all for the pure love of creating an unforgettable bowl of soup. At home, you can achieve an impressively rich chicken stock in roughly 4 hours with a careful combination of meat, vegetables, and aromatics.
Allow 2.5–4 Hours to Make Chicken Stock
As mentioned earlier, the longer your stock simmers, the more depth of flavour it develops. If you are short on time, follow the recipe instructions here and cook your broth for 2.5 hours. When time allows, extend the cooking time to up to 4 hours to extract as much goodness as possible.
Recipe: Warming Chicken Soup with Chilli Oil
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Warming Chicken Soup with Chilli Oil
Ingredients
Chilli Oil
- 3 tbsp chili flakes
- 2 tsp sesame seeds
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 sugar
- 1.5 tbsp garlic minced
- 1 tbsp ginger minced
- 200ml rapseed or sunflower oil
- 1 tbsp soy sauce
Chicken Soup
- 1.2kg chicken legs
- 1 whole garlic bulb + 2 additional garlic cloves crushed
- 1 large white onion
- 2 tsp sea salt
- 2 star anise
- 10 black peppercorns
- 1 tbsp ginger, minced
- 1 tbsp soy sauce
- 400g carrots
- 4 spring onions
- 200g long grain rice
Instructions
- Make the Chilli Oil: Place all chilli oil ingredients, apart from the oil and soy sauce, in a heat-proof bowl. Heat the oil over medium heat in a small pot until very hot, but not smoking.
- When ready, pour the hot oil carefully over the chili oil ingredients. It will sizzle and boil with bubbles. Add soy sauce, stir to combine and then let the chilli oil rest to develop flavour.
- For the soup: cut the end off the whole garlic bulb to expose its cloves. Chop the onion into quarters.
- Place chicken legs, whole garlic bulb, onion quarters, water and 2 teaspoons of salt into a large saucepan and bring to a boil. Place a lid on top and lower to a simmer for 1.5 hours.
- Take the chicken out of the stock and when cooled a little, remove the meat from the bones. Return the bones along with the skin, cartilage, star anise and peppercorns to the stock. Place a lid on top and simmer for a further 1 hour.
- Cook rice to packet instructions, drain and set aside for later.
- Strain the stock through a sieve and measure 1.7 litres. Add a little water if you have too less or if you have too much then freeze the extra stock and use at a later date.
- Using the same or a new medium-sized pot, gently fry the two crushed garlic cloves until soft. Add the carrot pieces and cook for a further 2 minutes. Pour in the chicken stock, bring to the boil, then cover, reduce to a simmer, and cook for 15 minutes, or until the carrots are tender.
- Add the shredded chicken back to the pot then stir through soy sauce, ginger and cooked rice. Heat for a couple of minutes until the rice is hot. Taste and season with extra salt and pepper if needed.
- Pour soup into bowls and garnish with sliced spring onions. Serve with the chilli oil so people can help themselves.