Chicken Vegetable Soup with Dill and Cumin

Ingredients

• 1 1/4-1 1/2 kg chicken pieces, preferably thighs or whole legs
• 1 large onion, peeled
• 1 sprig fresh thyme or 1 teaspoon dried thyme
• 2 tablespoons chopped parsley, with the stems reserved (optional)
• 2 bay leaves
• 4-6 medium boiling potatoes or 1 1/2 cups very fine noodles (soup noodles)
• 4 carrots, peeled if you like and cut in 5 cm lengths
• 2 stalks celery & tops, sliced (optional)
• 6-8 cups water
• salt & freshly ground black pepper
• 4 pale green squash or zucchini, cut in 5 cm lengths
• 225 g mushrooms, quartered
• 4 cloves garlic, coarsely chopped
• 1-2 teaspoon ground cumin, to taste (optional)
• 3-4 tablespoons chopped fresh dill or 1 tablespoon dried dill

Directions

1. 1

   Put chicken pieces in a large stew pan or soup pot.

2. 2

   Leave the onion whole for easy removal or cut it in large dice if you want to eat it in the soup.

3. 3

   If you like, tie the thyme sprigs, parsley stems and bay leaves together with kitchen twine or wrap them in cheesecloth for easy removal.

4. 4

   Peel potatoes and add to pan.

5. 5

   Add onion, carrots, celery, thyme, parsley stems and bay leaves.

6. 6

   Pour in enough water to cover the ingredients by a couple of centimeters and add salt.

7. 7

   Bring to a boil.

8. 8

   With a large spoon, remove the foam that collects on top.

9. 9

   Cover and cook over low heat for 45 mins.

10. 10

    ,occasionally skimming off the foam and fat that collects.

11. 11

    Add squash, mushrooms, garlic, cumin and pepper and bring to a simmer.

12. 12

    Cover and cook over low heat for 15 minsutes or until chicken and vegetables are tender and soup is well flavored.

13. 13

    Remove herb bundle or loose herbs.

14. 14

    Cook noodles in a large pan of boiling salted water about 7 minutes or until just tender.

15. 15

    Drain well.

16. 16

    Keep the noodles in a separate container if you plan to reheat the soup; otherwise they soften too much as they sit in the soup.

17. 17

    Before serving the soup, thoroughly skim the fat from the broth.

18. 18

    The cooler the broth is, the easier this will be.

19. 19

    The simplest way is to refrigerate the soup so the fat solidifies on top and can be easily removed.

20. 20

    Otherwise, skim the fat from the soup's surface several times with a large spoon.

21. 21

    Remove chicken pieces and discard their skin.

22. 22

    Leave pieces whole or pull or cut meat from bones; return chicken to soup.

23. 23

    For a lighter dish, you can reserve part of the meat for other uses.

24. 24

    Reheat soup if necessary.

25. 25

    If noodles are cold, bring them to room temperature or reheat them in a covered dish in the microwave.

26. 26

    Add dill and chopped parsley to soup.

27. 27

    Taste and adjust seasoning.

28. 28

    Serve the soup in fairly shallow bowls.

29. 29

    Add noodles to each bowl when serving.