Bread Soup

This soup has such a wonderful flavor because I made my own chicken 'stock'. Trying to see how many meals I can get from $8 worth of ingredients, I used up the rotisserie chicken carcass leftover from my 'Quick, Cheap, Lunch' post, from yesterday. I still have enough chicken for chicken salad sandwiches!
This is sort of like Pappa Al Pomodoro (which is basically a fancy Italian name for 'bread soup with tomatoes'), because I use tomatoes, bread and basil. Thats probably the only similarity. Oh and its soup.

Anyway, here is my recipe:
(this is an amazing soup)

1 rotisserie chicken carcass
3-4 cloves of garlic
1 tsp of basil (i used the squeeze tube type)
1 large or 2 smaller carrots, large chunks
4-6 cups of water (to cover)

To make the 'stock'

Put the carcass in a pot, along with carrots, garlic and basil. Cover with water, bring to boil, then lower to simmer. Simmer for an hour to hour and a half, until it tastes yummy and has a nice toasty brown colour.
Strain the liquid over a mesh strainer into a bowl. Discard all the bones and bits.

If you don't have time to do this (because who, really, has time for this?) put all the ingredients in a slow cooker, on low for 3 or 4 hours. Strain, and you're ready to go.

For the soup:

4-6 cups of home made stock (you could do store bought but i guarantee it wont be as tasty!)
1-1.5 cups shredded rotisserie chicken
1 large or 2 small carrots, thickly sliced
1-1.5 cup tomatoes (i used whole tomatoes from a can)
1 tsp (or another squeeze) basil
a couple of thick slices of day-old french bread (mine were about 2 inches thick) chopped into bite size pieces
garlic salt, pepper and a splash of lemon juice to taste
oh and sriracha! I used just a small squeeze :) you could do red pepper too

Add in chicken, carrots, tomato and basil to stock. Bring to a medium boil and cook about 15 minutes, till the carrots soften where you can put a fork through them easily (not mushy though!). Stir in bread and spices to taste. Cook another 5 to 10 minutes until bread gets soft. I like French bread in this because the chewy crust keeps the bread from dissolving everywhere, but the inside of the bread gets all soft like a dumpling.

Serve. No frills. This soup speaks for itself.

Tips to try

• Try this with Sourdough! The tang gives the soup just the right kick
• Smoked sausage instead of chicken
• Tomato soup instead of chicken stock