Myrna’s Jewish Chicken Soup. In the middle is a home-made matzo ball. This batch was just made. By Eileen Goldfinger. Editor @Blogfinger Re-posted from 2017.
Eileen (left) and Myrna Goldfinger. Chester, NJ. c.1995.
By Eileen Goldfinger, Food Editor @Blogfinger and Paul Goldfinger, MD, Regular Editor@Blogfinger.net
Most Jewish families have a favorite recipe for what has been called “heaven in a bowl” (Jaimie Oliver, chef.) It is a “classic comfort food” and has been part of Jewish tradition since medieval times.
Jewish chicken soup is often prepared to make the sick feel more comfortable. The Huffington Post says that it “has healing powers,” and the University of Nebraska documented some health benefits (anti-inflammatory effects) for colds; probably due to breathing in those delightful fumes.
Eileen follows the tradition of my Mom’s family who came over from Eastern Europe (Poland) shortly after the turn of the 20th century. They settled in Bayonne, New Jersey where they lived in a small row house on the Boulevard. There were 9 children. Grandpa Chaim was a tailor. He sewed uniforms for the Czar until he got to New Jersey.
Grandma Helen was a little gray haired lady with a tiny kitchen where she turned out phenomenal traditional foods. I previously posted the photo of my Mom’s 4 brothers in uniform, newly returned from WWII.
As a kid I loved to meet my cousins in Bayonne where we would search the attic and basement for souvenirs from the Pacific and eat all those treats which we craved at that little house.
My mom, Myrna, known also by her Jewish name–Malka, was best known for her soups, and the one I loved so much was her chicken soup with matzo balls and/or noodles. She always said that she had two “secret ingredients” which Eileen divulges below (with asterisks.)
Never try this recipe without those two items. Sometimes Mom would exaggerate, like when she would tell her students that my Dad was in the FBI and wore a secret code ring. They loved her because she told stories and because she would dance and sing at the drop of a hat.
Mom’s soup is great anytime, but especially for a cold day or if you have a cold..
So here is Myrna’s recipe for Jewish Chicken Soup. (Shared by Eileen Goldfinger, Food Editor @Blogfinger.net)
1 4 pound whole chicken, quartered, skinned; wrap it in a cheese cloth and tied with cotton string
1 large onion, diced
3 stalks celery, diced
4 carrots, peeled
2 cubes chicken bouillon*(see below for amount)
1 1/2 bunch fresh dill*
1 bunch fresh flat-leafed parsley
4 tablespoons vegetable oil
water
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper to taste
salt to taste
Heat oil in an 8 quart stock pot; add onions and celery; sauté for 10 minutes, until they wilt.
Cut 2 carrots into rounds and 2 carrots lengthwise and then in half. Add carrots to pot. Add chicken to pot and fill with water two inches above the chicken.
Bring to boil and then reduce heat to a simmer. Take ½ of the dill* and parsley, tie them together with cotton twine, and place in pot. Break bouillon cubes* into pieces and add to pot. Then add ½ teaspoon black pepper to pot; stir.
Place cover on pot, leaving it ajar; simmer for 1 hour.
Remove dill and parsley from soup and discard. Remove the lengths of carrot from pot, mash them and put them back into pot.
Taste soup; add more pepper and salt according to taste. Add 4 tablespoons of chopped dill to soup.
Serve with cooked thin noodles or matzo balls. (Matzo balls can be purchased in the kosher, refrigerated section of some grocery stores).
Serves 4 (PG note: Some people throw out the chicken after that, but I have always loved boiled chicken with Heinz ketchup.)
Mom adored Broadway show music, and she sang those songs all the time around the house. The last show she saw on Broadway was her very favorite, Oklahoma.
Eileen and I took her and bought her an official T shirt which said “I’m just a girl who can’t say no.” She was thrilled.
This song, “People Will Say We’re in Love” from Oklahoma is performed by Alfred Drake and Joan Roberts; written by Rodgers and Hammerstein, and would have brought tears to her eyes. (As did peeling and dicing onions for the soup)