Chicken Noodle Soup

The stomach bug has hit the entire family now. Judging from my scientific sampling (Facebook), it's hit a lot of entire families this week. We were making a fresh fettuccine dish from Mario Batali's book and I had about a half pound of the fresh pasta left over, so I decided to make chicken noodle soup for when the wife and others are feeling good enough to eat. It takes a bit of time but not so much effort. If you don't happen to have some leftover pasta dough, you can easily make some:

Crack two eggs, beat, add to about 1 1/2 cups of flour piled up in a ring (kind of like a flour bowl, or volcano) and start stirring in flour from the edges till it comes together, then knead it all together for about 10 minutes and wrap in plastic for a half hour.

The broth:
Add 6 chicken drumsticks, a half yellow onion chopped coarsely, one carrot cut into 1 inch chunks, and 1 celery stalk to a stockpot. I also added some leftover mushroom stems. Add about a tablespoon of salt and a couple of bay leaves, then add about a gallon of water. Bring to a boil, then simmer for about 1 1/2 hours, skimming the foam if you wish.

When the broth is done, drain through a strainer. Remove the meat from the drumsticks and reserve for the soup. Roll the pasta, then cut to fettuccine, then chop into 2 inch long pieces. Add the noodles to the broth, then coarsely chop the meat and add to the broth. The broth is probably hot enough to cook the noodles in about 5 minutes, or you can return the soup to a simmer for about 2 minutes.

Sure, it takes a bit of work to put together, but it beats the snot out of anything you'll get out of a can.