Chicken and Avocado Soup
Servings: 6
Ingredients
- 1 or 2 large bone-in skin-on chicken breast halves (depending on how much chicken you want in your soup)
- ½ large onion peeled
- 1 Tablespoon additive-free kosher salt such as Diamond Crystal
- A few peppercorns crushed
- A few garlic cloves crushed
- 2 Tablespoons unrefined cold pressed, extra virgin olive oil
- ½ large onion diced
- 3-4 scallions thinly sliced
- 3 medium carrots diced
- 2 stalks celery diced
- 1 jalapeno seeded (if you don’t want too much heat) and diced (optional)
- 1 clove garlic finely chopped
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin
- 8 cups chicken stock preferably homemade
- 2 teaspoons sea salt double this if you use unsalted stock
- freshly ground black pepper to taste
- ½ cup pico de gallo fresh tomato salsa
- 1-2 avocados peeled and cut into chunks or guacamole
- 1 lime cut into 6 wedges (my favorite part!)
- Other possible add-ins: tortilla chips chopped cilantro, shredded cheese
Instructions
- Poach the chicken: Place the chicken breast, onion half (halved again), salt, pepper and garlic into a medium saucepan. Add enough cold water to cover the chicken. Bring to a boil over high heat and lower heat to a simmer. Simmer chicken for 25 minutes. Remove from heat and allow chicken to sit in the liquid until cool enough to handle.
- In a large pot, warm the oil over medium heat. Add the chopped onion, scallions, carrots, celery and jalapeno. Sauté until onions are tender, about 5 minutes. Add garlic and cumin and cook for 1 minute.
- Add the chicken stock, salt and pepper and bring to a boil. Lower heat and simmer until carrots are tender, about 4-5 minutes.
- Pull chicken from liquid and remove skin and bones. Shred chicken into bite-size pieces. You can divide chicken amongst the 6 individual bowls or add it all to the pot.
- Put a heaping spoonful of pico de gallo and avocado chunks/guacamole in each individual bowl and ladle soup on top. Squeeze lime on top and sprinkle with corn tortilla chips and fresh cilantro, if desired.