Ginger chicken and vegetable noodle bowls 2

This is a big main course soup. Cooking the chicken produces more of the well flavoured broth than you will need and it also yields a chicken carcass, both of which can be frozen for further use. You can vary the vegetables used, just make sure they are cut small enough or sliced thinly enough to cook in 5 minutes in the broth.

Serves 6

1 medium (1.5kg) free range chicken, wing tips

cut off 8cm piece ginger, thinly sliced 4 cloves garlic, sliced 2 sticks celery, thinly sliced 300g carrots, peeled and thinly sliced 4 Tbsp naturally brewed Japanese soy sauce 4 small Shanghai bok choy, quartered

lengthways

4 x 200g packets cooked udon noodles or 350g of your favourite dried noodles boiled until al dente in plenty of water, drained ready when the soup is ready

1 red chilli, thinly sliced

Coriander sprigs for serving 1 Put the chicken into a large saucepan and cover well with water. Add the ginger and garlic, bring to the boil and boil gently 1 hour. In the first 15 minutes, skim the scum so that the stock is clear. Remove the cooked chicken to a platter and let cool until able to be handled.

Strain the stock and remove 1.5 litres. Cool and freeze it for further use in soups and sauces. It will make a great gravy for a roast chicken.

Pull the meat off the bones of the chicken and break into bite-sized pieces. Reserve. Freeze the carcass for making more stock. Put the remaining stock in a clean saucepan and bring to the boil. Add the reserved chicken meat to the boiling stock with the celery, carrots, soy sauce and bok choy. Simmer 5 minutes, taste and season. Add the cooked noodles, mix well and bring back to the boil. Serve in bowls sprinkled with chilli and coriander. Free-range chicken is very competitively priced in New World. You may be surprised to know that our own Pams Chicken is all free-range. It’s also hormone free and is grown with love by Kiwi farmers. There is no imported fresh chicken in New Zealand. Look for new portion-controlled Pams Free Range Chicken in store — as many of us try to cut back a little, portion control helps us do that, easily.