Remember the best-selling bookChicken Soup for the Soul, an anthology of inspirational stories to help people feel better about themselves? No one questioned the culinary metaphor in the title. It takes no stretch of the imagination. In nearly every culture, chicken soup is soul food, providing comfort to all who drink in its hot and healing properties. Whether it’s a simple broth or enhanced with noodles, rice, or matzo balls, it makes you feel nourished and comforted.

当一个朋友听到我被问到我写关于鸡汤的文章时，她笑着说：“当然，你是犹太祖母。”没错，鸡汤是我烹饪曲目的重要组成部分。我已经做了很长时间了，几乎是反射。我的汤清晰，浓郁，味道良好。I get such great results not because I’m a Jewish grandmother, but because I pay attention to a few details that really count—starting with the right chicken, substantially reducing the broth after it has been strained, and knowing how to cook, but not overcook, vegetables, noodles, and rice.

From my huge international repertoire of chicken soups, I’ve chosen three of the simplest and most comforting for this article: classic chicken noodle soup, Portuguese soup with lemon and mint, and matzo ball soup. They’re family favorites, and many of my customers at Square One restaurant loved them as well.

最佳汤：一只老母鸡或犹太肉鸡

When I was growing up in Brooklyn, chicken soup always began with a walk to the kosher poultry store. We would select a fine live pullet (a young hen that hasn’t yet begun laying eggs), have it killed, cleaned, and cut up on the spot, and then carry it home to make soup. Alas, finding a bird of that quality has become almost impossible. Even chickens labeled “free range” don’t have the flavor of those kosher pullets. And big roasters, although they’re the right size, are too fatty and don’t give off enough flavor.

那么，我今天用什么做鸡肉呢？If I can find an older hen or rooster at my market, I buy it. Otherwise, I get two large broilers, which are younger, smaller chickens that weigh about 3 1/2-or 4-pounds. I might ask the butcher to cut up the birds and maybe throw in a few extra necks and backs for a richer broth.

我喜欢使用犹太鸡，因为它们在加工过程中腌制，因此具有更多的风味。帝国是我喜欢的一个品牌。如果我不使用犹太鸡肉，我将其清洁，然后用切割的柠檬擦整只鸟或零件，然后轻轻撒上粗盐，以增强其风味。我用塑料包裹咸鸡肉，然后将其冷藏过夜，甚至仅几个小时（烹饪前无需冲洗盐）。无论如何，此步骤并非必不可少，但是它确实带来了更多的风味，并使肉汤的味道更加鸡肉。

For great broth: simmer to extract flavor, strain, and reduce by half

在解释如何制作汤之前，让我澄清一些烹饪条款。鸡汤is the finished product with all the garnishes and components. It containschicken broth, chicken, vegetables, and often a starchy addition like noodles, rice, or dumplings. Broth is similar to stock, except it has deeper flavor. Broth can be a soup in its own right (think of consommé), while鸡肉汤is a base for other dishes, a foundation for a sauce, or a starting point for other soups. There are times when broth and stock are interchangeable, but for chicken soup, you definitely want the fuller flavor of broth.

为了做一个基本的鸡肉汤，you simmer fresh chicken, carrots, onions, celery, and a few aromatics, such as parsley, thyme, and peppercorns. A few cloves of garlic and bay leaf might also be added. Some cooks include a parsnip for sweetness, others a piece of celery root or parsley root. Chinese cooks add ginger slices. Some families stick a few cloves into the onion. If I plan to take the broth in a particular ethnic direction, I might add two strips of lemon or lime zest, a few dried red chiles, or a smashed stalk of lemongrass.

Note that I haven’t mentioned salt. Because the liquid reduces substantially, any salt added at the start would become concentrated, and you might end up with an oversalted broth. To avoid this, add this critical seasoning at the end.

Measurements needn’t be exact。My basic recipe suggests six pounds of chicken parts. If you’re a little over, just bump up the vegetables a bit. The important thing is that everything in the pot is initially covered by about two inches of cold water. As the broth simmers uncovered, that gives you a good margin for evaporation.

对于透明的汤，重要的是要在液体沸腾时脱离浮渣，然后将热量减少到煮熟。在煮沸的前半小时，我继续浏览。

经过三个小时的沸腾，几乎所有的味道都是从鸡肉和蔬菜中提取的。鸡肉干燥，通常是无味的 - 它的味道已经进入了整个想法中，因此我将其与car体和蔬菜一起粘贴并丢弃。

在这一点上，我冷却汤。快速执行此操作（冰浴效果很好），并发现以避免发酵的机会。然后，我盖上它，冷藏，然后等待脂肪凝结在上面，以便于去除。在胆固醇意识时代之前，鸡肉的汤是由诱人地表面漂浮的金色脂肪液滴的数量来判断的。我对这种色彩和丰富性的丧失有不同的看法，但是我忠实地遵守了当前的健康格言，并将脂肪剥离。

With the fat gone, you’re left with a light broth.The most efficient way to intensify it is to boil it to reduce its volume by half, or until the flavor hits the level you want. Or, if you would rather not evaporate away half the liquid, you can make what I call a double chicken broth: Make a second batch of broth using the first batch (not water) as the cooking medium. You’ll need another fresh chicken to do this.

预先提示：分别烹饪面条或米饭以获得更多控制

Now that you’ve got an intense, delicious broth, you can serve it as a simple nourishing soup or dress it up. There are no real rules here. You could add noodles, tortellini, ravioli, filled wontons, dumplings, rice, bread, vegetables, chicken pieces, grated cheese, poached eggs, beaten eggs, egg and lemon, parsley, mint, cilantro… whatever sounds good to you.

作为一家繁忙餐厅的厨师，我了解到控制菜质质量的一种方法是单独烹饪所有零件，然后在最后一分钟组合。这不是我通常在家做饭的方式，但是当我在汤中添加装饰时，我使用这种技术来确保每个元素的完美含量。它还让我绝对提前做所有事情。单独煮米饭，面条，胡萝卜或鸡肉并不需要额外的努力，我认为这一切都会有所不同。

如果您宁愿一次在肉汤中烹饪所有东西，可以，但是请注意添加它们的时机和顺序以避免过度煮熟。

要添加鸡肉，请在减少的肉汤中煮新鲜的无骨胸肉。You don’t need to buy extra boneless breasts to do this. You can just cut the breast meat off the whole bird or chicken parts you plan to use for the broth, reserving it for later. Whether you poach the breast whole or cut it into pieces before cooking doesn’t matter, but either way, you want to avoid poaching for too long and ending up with overly soft, weak-flavored chicken.

鸡蛋面是我的偏爱chicken noodle soup。他们温柔,有一个漂亮的嘟嘟声hsome quality. In a pinch, I might use pastina or other small pasta. To avoid soggy noodles, cook them in boiling salted water and drain them the minute they’re al dente. They continue cooking a bit even after being drained, and again once they’re added to the broth, so err on the side of undercooking.

If it’s a rice soup, I lean toward basmati.It holds its shape better than most other long-grain varieties, and it has a lovely, delicate fragrance. As with pasta, I cook the rice separately until it’s still got some bite left.

One last point: only add noodles and rice to the broth you plan on serving at that meal. These starches continue absorbing liquid, which means that after several hours, they’ll be waterlogged, and you’ll end up with hardly any broth.

Matzo ball soup: a Passover tradition and cold-weather winner

Matzo Ball Soup是逾越节Seder餐中必不可少的一部分，对于秋季和冬季寒冷的日子来说，这也是令人心动的汤。如果您没有尝试过，那是一个由磨碎的发食，鸡蛋，脂肪和调味料制成的饺子。包装的地面发酵粉被称为MATZO餐，通常在超市全年可用。

丰富的味道来自鸡肉脂肪。Rendered chicken fat is traditional, but you can substitute with the fat that you’ve scooped off the refrigerated broth. If you want to use rendered fat, ask your butcher; he may have some in reserve.

对于漂浮的发酵球，不要过度混合。As with muffin batter, you want to fold in the dry ingredients until just combined. Form the balls gently with your hands without compacting them. Also crucial is the cooking time. The longer you poach the matzo balls in boiling water, the lighter they’ll be.