Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup

This Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup starts with a whole chicken, 3 vegetables, and water. No cartons of stock, no shortcuts, no long list of herbs. Just a clear golden broth that tastes like chicken, which is the entire point.

The Secret To Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup From Scratch

My mom made chicken soup with a whole chicken, 3 vegetables, and water. That’s the whole list. No garlic, no bay leaf, no little bundle of herbs tied up with string.

It took me a long time to understand that was deliberate. When there’s nothing else in the pot, the broth tastes like chicken. Properly like chicken. Put in garlic and thyme and a bay leaf and you’ve made a perfectly nice soup, but now it tastes like soup. Not the same thing.

The other thing she did was get 2 meals out of 1 bird. Half the chicken goes into the soup. The other half went into the oven to roast, and that was dinner the next night. There’s a whole section on that further down, because it changes how you think about buying a 4 pound chicken.

It takes about 1 hour and 50 minutes start to finish, and most of that is the pot simmering quietly while you’re in another room.

Why A Whole Chicken Makes The Best Chicken Noodle Soup

You can make chicken soup with boneless breasts and a carton of broth. It’ll be fine. It’ll also taste like what it is.

A whole chicken brings skin, bones, and connective tissue, and all 3 of those break down over an hour of simmering into something a carton can’t give you. The broth comes out with body. It coats the spoon a little. When it cools in the fridge it sets up like jelly, and that’s how you know you did it right.

You also get a free meal out of it, which I’ll get to.

How To Get Clear Chicken Broth

Everything depends on the first 10 minutes. As the pot comes up to a boil, grey foam rises to the top. That’s protein coming out of the chicken. Skim it off with a skimmer or a slotted spoon, and then keep skimming until no more shows up.

If you leave it, it breaks apart as the soup simmers and you end up with cloudy broth. It’s still good soup. It just looks murky in the bowl.

Once it’s skimmed and you’ve turned the heat down, leave it alone. A hard boil churns everything up again. You want the surface barely moving.

Ingredients in Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup

• Whole chicken (4 pounds, with skin and bones): The skin and bones are the recipe. Don’t start with boneless breasts, you’ll get chicken flavored water.
• Carrots (2 medium, peeled): They go in whole and come out soft and sweet, and then they get chopped and go back in.
• Onion (1 medium, skin removed): Whole, not chopped. It gives everything to the broth and then you throw it away, and it will have earned it.
• Celery (2 stalks): Same treatment as the carrots. Whole in, chopped back.
• Water (4 quarts): Not broth. The whole point is that we’re making the broth.
• Egg noodles (2 cups dry, about 4 ounces): That looks like too few. It isn’t. They swell to about 3 times the size and they keep going in the leftovers.
• Chicken bouillon cube (1, or 1 tablespoon Vegeta): Vegeta is the Eastern European version and it’s what I grew up with. Either one rounds out the broth at the end.
• Salt (2 teaspoons, divided, or to taste): Half goes in at the start so the chicken seasons as it cooks, half at the end once you can taste what you’ve got.
• Black pepper (1 teaspoon, or to taste): Added at the end with the noodles.
• Fresh parsley (¼ cup, chopped): In at the very end so it stays green and tastes fresh.

How To Make Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup

Get the pot going: Pull the gizzard bag out of the chicken, and don’t skip checking, it’s hiding in the cavity. Put the whole 4 pound chicken into an 8 quart stockpot. Add the 4 quarts of water, the whole onion, the 2 whole carrots, and the 2 celery stalks. Everything should be under the water. Add 1 teaspoon of the salt. Bring it up to a boil over medium high heat.

Skim it: As it comes to a boil, grey foam collects on the surface. Skim it off with a skimmer or slotted spoon and keep going until no more appears. This takes a few minutes and it’s the difference between clear broth and cloudy broth.

Simmer: Turn the heat down to medium low, cover, and let it go for about 1 hour. You want the carrots fork tender and the chicken nearly falling off the bone.

Get the chicken out and let it cool: Lift the chicken and the vegetables out onto a large plate or bowl. Now walk away for 15 to 20 minutes. A chicken that just came out of an hour long simmer is not something you can pick apart with your hands, and I’d rather you took the break than the burn.

Chop the vegetables: Chop the cooked carrots and celery and put them back in the pot. The onion has done its job, so that one goes in the garbage.

Shred the chicken: Pull about half the meat off the bones and add it to the soup. Set the other half aside. There’s a section coming up on what to do with it.

Noodles and seasoning: Add the 2 cups of egg noodles and the bouillon cube to the pot, along with the remaining 1 teaspoon of salt and the 1 teaspoon of pepper. Give it a taste.

Cook the noodles: Simmer 5 to 10 minutes, until the noodles are tender. Resist adding more. They’re going to keep swelling while the soup sits, and tomorrow you’ll have a casserole.

Finish it: Taste one more time and adjust the salt and pepper. Stir in the ¼ cup of chopped parsley and serve.

How Long To Boil A Whole Chicken For Soup

About 1 hour at a gentle simmer for a 4 pound bird. You’ll know it’s ready when a leg pulls away from the body without much argument and the carrots slide off a fork.

You can go longer and the meat will get softer, but past about 90 minutes the breast starts going stringy. An hour is the sweet spot.

Don’t let it boil hard the whole time. A rolling boil makes the broth cloudy and it toughens the meat. Low and slow and barely bubbling.

Can You Use Store Bought Chicken Broth?

You can, and sometimes you should. If you’ve got cooked chicken to use up and 30 minutes, use broth instead of water and skip straight to the noodles.

It won’t be the same soup. Carton broth is thinner and saltier and it doesn’t have the body you get from bones. Cut the added salt down to ½ teaspoon and taste before you add more.

If you want the fast version properly written out, my Instant Pot Chicken Noodle Soup does the whole thing in a fraction of the time.

Tips For The Best Chicken Noodle Soup

• Skim early, skim thoroughly. Everything about how the soup looks is decided in the first 10 minutes.
• Keep it at a bare simmer. If the surface is rolling, the heat’s too high.
• Salt at both ends. Some at the start so the chicken seasons from the inside, some at the finish once you can taste the broth.
• Less noodles than you think. Two cups dry. They triple.
• Let the chicken cool before you shred it. Twenty minutes. Make a cup of tea.
• Cook the noodles separately if you’re making this ahead. More on that below.

What To Do With The Other Half Of The Chicken

Only half the chicken goes into the soup, and that’s on purpose.

My mom would take the other half and roast it in the oven, and that was the next night’s dinner. One chicken, 2 meals, and the second one barely counts as cooking because the bird is already done.

If roasting isn’t your plan, the cooked meat keeps 3 to 4 days in the fridge and it’s good in just about anything. Chicken salad sandwiches. On top of a green salad. Stirred into rice. Shredded over a baked potato. Or tucked into a quesadilla with whatever cheese is open.

You can also freeze it in a bag for up to 3 months and pull it out the next time a recipe calls for cooked chicken.

Make It In The Instant Pot Or The Crockpot

Same soup, different timeline.

Instant Pot Chicken Noodle Soup is the one I reach for on a weeknight. Pressure does in minutes what the stove does in an hour.

Crockpot Chicken Noodle Soup is for the mornings when you want to deal with dinner before 9am and then forget about it.

And if somebody in the house is already sniffling, my Flu Fighter Chicken Noodle Soup has more going on in it.

What To Serve With Chicken Noodle Soup

Bread. That’s the real answer. No Knead Bread if you planned ahead, or Quick Yeast Dinner Rolls if you didn’t.

A grilled cheese on the side turns it into an actual dinner instead of a starter. And something sharp and green helps cut through all that rich broth, so a simple salad with a lemony dressing is never wrong.

If you want more soup in your life while you’re here, Chicken Rice Soup and Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup are over on Craving Home Cooked, and my Romanian Meatball Soup is the other one my family made constantly.

How To Store And Freeze Chicken Noodle Soup

In the fridge, 3 to 4 days in an airtight container. The noodles will keep drinking up broth, so it’ll be thicker on day 2. Loosen it with a splash of water or broth when you reheat.

To freeze, leave the noodles out. Freeze the soup without them for 4 to 6 months, then thaw, bring it back to a simmer, and cook fresh noodles in it. Frozen cooked noodles come back mushy every single time.

If you know you’re freezing some, pull a portion out before you add the noodles at all. Much easier than fishing them out later.

Try These Recipes Next

• Creamy Potato Soup
• Chicken and Dumplings
• Homemade Pasta
• Matzo Ball Soup
• Italian Wedding Soup

Originally posted April, 2011.