Chinese Herbal Chicken Soup

Step 1

Let’s prepare our ingredients. Rinse the chicken and remove any innards. Place the whole chicken in a large pot. You want enough room in the pot of your choice to allow for water to cover the whole chicken.

Step 2

Rinse off all of the dried herbs or dunk them in a bowl of cool water. This is just to remove any dirt/debris before placing them in the soup. Rinse or remove the herbs from water and place them in the pot with the chicken.

Step 3

Add the remaining ingredients to the pot with the chicken and herbs: ginger root, garlic, and enough water to just cover the chicken in your pot.Bring it all up to a boil. Once it starts to boil for a few minutes, remove any scum floating on the top of the soup. Continue to periodically check for any additional scum, and remove it.

Step 4

Lower the heat to a low-to-medium heat. Allow it to continue to simmer for another 1.5 hours. You want the chicken to be tender, but you also don’t want it to be completely falling apart. The water at this point should have reduced.

Step 5

Remove the pot from heat. Remove the chicken and plate on a large plate. Remove all of the dried herbs and ginger root from the soup with a slotted spoon. You could also remove the garlic or leave the garlic in the soup to eat. Note: We actually left some of the goji berries (as you can see in some of the pictures), so you can remove them or eat them as well.

Step 6

This is where you have a couple of choices: Serve the chicken in whole sectioned pieces in each bowl, or Remove the meat from the bones and return to the soup. For ease of eating for the whole family, we always remove the meat from the chicken and put it back in the soup. This way no one is picking through bones later, however, this is totally your choice/preference.

Step 7

Each individual salts their own bowl to taste. Add some freshly chopped green onions and enjoy!