What’s in Chicken Noodle Soup?
It doesn’t take many ingredients or complicated ingredients to make homemade chicken noodle soup. You only need chicken, a few basic veggies, herbs, and spices to make chicken noodle soup. Here are the ingredients you’ll need:
- Vegetables: I make a straightforward mirepoix with celery, carrot, and onion, and I add a little garlic for flavor. This vegetable medley simmers with the chicken to produce a delicious homemade soup broth. The vegetables give the soup a ton of color and texture as well.
- Bone-in Chicken: The best chicken noodle soup is made with bone-in chicken, which is essential. I use bone-in, skinless chicken breasts, so there are tasty bits of white meat all over my soup. Feel free to use drumsticks or thighs if you prefer dark meat. Although you can leave the skin on while the soup simmers and remove it later if you want an extra-rich soup, I prefer to remove the skin to cut down on excess fat.
- Herbs and Spices: The traditional warm flavor of this soup is derived from a blend of basil, parsley, thyme, bay leaf, and pepper. Naturally, we also add salt to enhance the natural flavors even more!
- Water: To make an incredibly delicious homemade broth, simmer the chicken, veggies, and seasoning in water.
- Noodles: You can use pretty much any type of pasta shape for this recipe; some suggestions are stars, alphabet pasta, fideo, or ditalini. I personally like to use wide egg noodles for this soup because of its airy texture.
Can I Use Rotisserie Chicken?
You can use shredded rotisserie chicken instead of raw chicken in this homemade chicken noodle soup recipe if you want to cut corners. Before starting to make the soup, remove the chicken meat from the bones. Then, add the leftover carcass to the soup pot and simmer it with the vegetables rather than the entire chicken breast. Before reserving the shredded chicken at the end, remove the bones.
Alternatively, you can use a pre-made chicken broth in place of simmering the bones and then just add the shredded rotisserie chicken at the end. While this is a very quick way to make chicken soup, creating your own broth will yield a much better flavor!
The BEST Chicken Noodle Soup
The flavoring is fantastic, the ingredients are basic, and this is the BEST chicken noodle soup recipe ever! You know that you’re going to need a hearty bowl of chicken noodle soup to get you through these upcoming and impending colder days. This soup is ideal because it uses simple, easy ingredients to create a rich, flavorful soup that is full of thick slices of vegetables, chunks of chicken, and all the flavor you could ask for.
When you’re feeling under the weather and need something to warm and comfort you from the inside out, homemade chicken noodle soup is the perfect choice. My entire family always enjoys this soup when I make it, and I know yours will too! Serve it with these rolls, my Grandma’s homemade bread, or easy no-knead bread, and you’re set! Trust me when I say that you will want to double this recipe and make it frequently this winter.
