Sometimes a pot of soup cures you. It makes the house warm, smells great and soothes weary bones. Being 2020, we were expecting a major storm yesterday. Only six inches and 3 loaves of bread later, all we have is this great soup. My basic chicken soup starts with the trilogy (diced carrots, celery, onion) sauteed in EVOO and seasoned with a ton of fresh dill, thyme, salt and pepper. After trilogy is sweated (about 5 minutes) toss in the whole chicken, fill pot with water and cook for about 90 minutes. Turn flame off, let cool enough to handle and then carefully remove the chicken from pot (some folks like to wrap the chicken in cheese cloth to easily remove without the chicken falling apart). I use a large spider strainer and just scoop that birdie up (see pic below of this strainer). Let chicken cool then remove bones & skin from meat and toss bones & skin. Put meat back in pot and return to heat. I add more seasoning (dill, salt, pepper, thyme) and let it cook for about another 20 minutes. Serve with crusty buttered bread.

For this dinner we had some leftover appetizers from a dinner a few days ago. Some prosciutto, mortadella, fresh mozzarella, roasted peppers and kalamata olives made for a perfect starter.

Spider Strainers: