Awesomely Fantastic Slow Cooker Chicken Soup
This is the soup you want when you're feeling under the weather, or even when you're just feeling down; just make it easy by using your Crock-Pot!
Servings 8
Ingredients
- 1 medium yellow onion, chopped
- 5 whole carrots, peeled and chopped
- 3 celery stalks, chopped
- 2 tablespoon minced garlic
- 1 tablespoon thyme
- 1 tablespoon parsley
- 1.5 teaspoon turmeric
- ½ teaspoon cayenne (omit or cut back, if sensitive to spice)
- Sea salt, to taste
- Black pepper, to taste
- 3.5-5 lb whole chicken (you'll have extra cooked chicken to shred for another recipe if you use a 5-pounder!)
- 8 cups water
- 1 bay leaf
Instructions
- Spread veggies out across the bottom of a 6-8 quart slow cooker. Add garlic, and season vegetables with thyme, parsley, turmeric, cayenne, sea salt, and black pepper.
- Place the whole chicken on top of the veggies (remove and discard giblets first, if present). Pour in water and throw in the bay leaf.
- Cook on low for 8-10 hours, then turn the Crock-Pot off, discard the bay leaf, and carefully remove chicken from the crock onto a rimmed baking sheet (it will be falling apart). Let the chicken cool for 10-15 minutes, then shred chicken, discarding skin, bones, and cartilage.
- Skim any accumulated fat off of the soup and return the shredded meat back to the soup. (See Note.) Taste soup and add additional salt & pepper, if desired, then serve.
Notes
If you use a larger chicken, you can reserve some of the cooked shredded meat for another dinner later -- My chicken was a little over five pounds, and I returned about ⅔ to the soup and was able to freeze ⅓ for other uses. Bonus! :)