Here's my recipe which is pretty well a standard soup recipe and nothing original other than that I like to roast the bones, the garlic and onion when making the stock. Here packaged in twos in the supermarket, after they've removed most of the meat for their trays of wings, breasts etc. But there's still enough meat on the bones for a great and flavourful soup. Soup Ingredients: Homemade chicken stock - about 2 quarts 2 carrots - diced 2 stalks celery - diced 1 leek - diced 1 cup diced rutabaga or orange squash 1/2 cup fine soup noodles salt & pepper oil or chicken fat Ratio of solids to stock should be about 2 cups stock to 1 lb chopped vegetables. Add any more chopped veg if you don't have enough. Stock ingredients: 1 meaty chicken carcass or piece of whole chicken 2 heads of garlic 1 onion - cut in half celery stick - sliced 1 carrot sliced fresh thyme - large sprig 1 bayleaf black pepper & salt MAKING STOCK: 1. Early in day or day before: Preheat oven to 350F. Cut top off heads of garlic. Place on roasting pan together with chicken carcass and sliced onion and drizzle a bit of oil over top of all. (I had two carcasss to roast as they are sold this way in pairs at our supermarket. I also added a couple of beef bones.) Roast in oven about 40 minutes or until all is toasted. and juices from pan. 2. Put bones into a very large pot. Squeeze one head of the buttery garlic cloves into the stock pot, saving the other head of garlic for adding to the soup. Add the rest of the stock ingredients and fill pot with water to cover. Grind in fresh pepper. Bring to boil, turn down heat, put on lid and simmer for a couple of hours. Skim off any grey residue that rises to the top. 3. Afterwards, strain the solid debris from the stock ---(REMEMBER you're saving the stock so don't pour it down the sink - as has been done LOL !). I look through the solids and pick out the meaty chicken pieces to save for the soup. Throw away all the rest of the solid material. Here I let it cool and refrigerate until next day when it's easy to remove solid fat from top. Otherwise continue to make soup. MAKING THE SOUP: 1. Sauté the chopped ingredients in a frypan in a TBS of chicken fat or oil until lightly golden. Squeeze out the buttery cloves from the 2nd head of garlic and add to pan. 2. Put soup ingredients including small bits of chicken into large saucepan and add an appropriate amount of stock - about double the amount of liquid to vegetables. Put on lid and simmer with lid on for about an hour. Add soup noodles during last 5 minutes. 3. Check seasoning, add salt. Also good for the end of the Christmas turkey. SharonCb

The Southwest Seasoning is a blend I get from Penzey's but you can also get blends from your regular grocery store. Penzey's is: salt, sweet ancho pepper, onion, garlic, Tellicherry black pepper,Mexican oregano, cayenne pepper, cumin, chipotle and cilantro. The seasoning is good but you could substitute black pepper and a kick like cayenne. Or, you could just leave it out and the soup is still very good. I like the tumeric mostly for the color...and it's good for you:) Sharon, thank you! We had the fresh salmon cakes last week for the first time since Spring. They are one of our Fall and Winter dishes. During warmer months we usually grill all our fish. (BTW, I've missed your pictures too...always beautiful!!!) Marilyn

Thanks Carol and Woodie... No it wasn't me that tossed the stock down the drain Carol, but I know I've nearly done it several times...LOL and someone else did do it as I remember. It would be so easy to do wouldn't it, when we're so accustomed to draining something in the sink. Woodie I'm sure Ken's chicken soup is first rate ! I used to make thick lentil or chickpea soups more often than chicken soup, but I now love the flavour after the bones, garlic and onion have been roasted first. I often sauté the vegetables first in garlicky oil when making a lentil or chickpea soup as well, as it adds to the rich, toasty flavour. Mmm I look forward to soup weather. It's still pretty warm here but nights are turning a bit cooler. SharonCb

* Posted by coconut-nj (My Page) on Sat, May 30, 09 at 11:27 Sally, anywhere that has alot of British imports would probably have it. I was checking out who had it online the other day and while you might not want 6 bottles of it.. smiles... Amazon has 6 bottles for $27.05. It's free shipping too. Most places sell it for between five and six or up to eight dollars, so that's a great price. They say they're 15 oz bottles. Maybe somebody else would want to go in on it with you?? I've always heard of it described as a mayo with more vinegar and also with a mustard taste. Sounds good. Smiles. My DW used it when she used to travel to the UK all the time for buisness. Surprised she didn't bring any back. I have a head of savoy cabbage so I'm going to make my easy 'stuffed' cabbage casserole that I described above. It makes it so easy and quick which is just what we want on a Saturday night. Steam the cabbage briefly, layer it with dirty rice, pour some tomato juice mixed with onion and garlic powder between layers and on top and bake for about 40 minutes. I'll see if I can manage to take a picture. I seem to be terrible at that. The camera is always in the other room and it's a kind of big house and by the time I'm done cooking I'm not walking very well. LOL.. We will see. Oh btw, I always make two dishes of this because Christy gets burnt out on "red" since I always have something made with red sauce around I make her a version with just some broth on it. I do stuffed peppers for her the same way. No red. I do love the red on it but prefer tomato juice since it's nice and light although I'll just water down tomato sauce or puree with chicken stock/broth, if I don't have any handy.