Winter Chicken Soup
Photo: Carolina Ayala / Contributor
The weather this winter has yoyo-ed from shirt sleeve balmy to cold enough to require winter jackets. This environmental unbalance can cause unbalances in our respiratory system resulting in mild sniffles to a more serious cold or flu like illness. At times like this, there’s nothing quite like an aromatic nourishing bowl of chicken soup to soothe the blues. One of my walking buddies was recently down for almost a week with a cold that left her throat in a lot of pain and here is a chicken soup, deeply infused with crushed black pepper and cloves, I made for her.
Crushing spices helps incorporate their flavor into the broth and black pepper and cloves have been a home remedy for sore throats for millennia in India. Dairy can often make congestion worse, so I used coconut milk instead – it’s also easier to digest. The soup has more vegetables than chicken, which makes it even more nourishing. Make sure to use chicken on the bone for best results.