Now is chicken soup season. It warms up on cold days and is also useful for colds. Chef Ludger Schettel of the Hotel Schettel in Olsberg, Hochsauerlandkreis, explains how broth works.
Ingredients: You will need one or two chicken soups, water, a carrot, the white part of a leek, one-eighth of celery, and half an onion. Aroma brings salt, pepper, three juniper grains, five allspice grains, and two bay leaves. The chef does not use chicken breasts in soup, but separates them and uses them to make fricassee for example.
First in the oven: Before the chicken is cooked through in the soup pot, the chef will brown the wings, chicken thighs, and coarse chicken pieces again in the oven at 180°C for about 25 minutes. This brings taste. Meat and bones should not darken too much, otherwise the broth will turn out to be bitter in taste.
Then in destiny: Cover the roasted parts in a saucepan with cold water. Add salt. With half the cap on, slowly heat the liquid. Discard the increased turbidity with a perforated spoon. Cut the leeks, carrots and celery into pieces and add them to the liquid along with the spices and onions. Simmer on low heat for about 1.5 hours.
lose weight: Pour the cooked soup through a fine sieve into a saucepan, mix with a pinch of salt and leave to cool. A layer of fat forms on the broth. Take off this. To serve, heat the soup. For a particularly good broth, the cooks let it boil again. Read how to do it in the box on the left.
chicken soup illustration
If the soup needs to be very tasty and clear, professional chefs heat it again and remove the suspended matter. Then experts refer to it as broth or consomme.
There are several ways to filter soup, that is, remove small particles. Ludger Schettel makes a mixture of finely chopped chicken soup, finely chopped carrots, finely chopped whites of leeks and a piece of celery, plus three egg whites.
Two juniper berries, five allspice and bay leaf are added as seasonings. Cool this mixture for two hours.
Then enter the cold broth and boil with it. Stir frequently until nothing settles to the bottom. Protein coagulates. It binds the substance suspended in the broth and rises to the surface in the form of grayish-white foam. Keep scraping the foam.
After boiling, reduce the temperature and let the soup marinate for an hour.
Finally, place a colander with a cotton cloth over a saucepan and pour the soup. If necessary, taste the broth again and serve it hot, for example with some chopped vegetables.
If you have any leftovers, this soup can be frozen and used as a base for sauces and stews.
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