Cheater's Chicken Soup... and that's not all

Even though I've written another post about my Grandmom's red sauce, I'm going to write it again, this time with recipe. (Score!)

The reason? The boy and I decided to have red sauce involved in this week's food and I got a stock pot, which I needed desperately. Bed Bath and Beyond's 20% one item coupon made my Denmark Stainless Steel 8-quart covered stock pot $16 or so bucks. Sweet!

Why not make red sauce? That's what came up when we were pouring over this week's grocery circular to decide what to buy for the week. Surely! But it requires only one carrot and one celery stalk.

Oooh, I know! I'll make chicken soup too!

Here's the red sauce recipe:
1 - Heat 1/4 cup olive oil in a large pot.
2 - Brown 1/2 medium white onion, 4-6 cloves garlic (both chopped of course) and a Bay leaf? (Maybe it's basil leaf, but it's not what I have in my cupboard.
3 - Add 1 carrot, 1 stalk celery (cut to 1" pieces), 3 large cans of Cento peeled tomatoes with Basil leaf (there it is!) and 1 tiny can Cento tomato paste.
4 - Bring to a boil then lower heat to simmer, covered for 1 hour.
5 - Add 1 lb ground beef, 1 egg, and enough Italian bread crumbs and grated parm to form meatballs.
6 - After the hour, strain the sauce. I use the OXO food mill and this time used the plate/insert with the largest holes and think it's the best so far!
7 - Return strained sauce to pot, drop in meatballs, cover and simmer for 1-3 hours.
(Yeah, I know, 1-3 hours is pretty vague but this leaves you flexibility. Just ensure meatballs are cooked through!)

Now for the main part of this blog - my DELICIOUS (unless I mess up) "Cheater's Chicken Soup."

Disclaimer: This is easy, quick and yum! But it may take a lot of pots

Ingredients:
1 bag of carrots, peeled (Or cheat further, get baby carrots!)
2/3 bag of celery stalks
8-10 pieces of chicken breast tenders (boneless, skinless)
Half bag or more egg noodles, medium is a good size but it's up to you
7 cups chicken broth or 7 chicken bouillon cubes (cheaper too!)
Salt, pepper, garlic, Italian seasoning, bay leaf
*And, most importantly, a ZipLock steamer bag*

1 - Fill the steamer bag with carrots and celery, cut into soup size pieces
2 - Sprinkle in some Italian Seasoning and microwave per directions on bag
? - If using bouillon, boil 7 cups water and dissolve 7 cubes
3 - Add chicken and 1 cup broth covered pan ("Hamburger Helper size pan")
4 - Cover and cook on low-med heat until chicken is cooked through and falling apart
Add in some garlic powder if you'd like.
6 - Cook pasta (this isn't really six, since the pasta kind of needs to be done at this point)
7 - Squish the chicken if need be to make it piece-y
8 - Add chicken, broth, pasta, and steam bag full of veggies to a large pot
9 - Sprinkle lots o' salt, and a pot top surface of pepper, garlic, Italian seasoning
10 - Add bay leaf
11 - Simmer, covered, for as long as you can wait before you die of hunger. Or like 15 minutes.

ENJOY!

Okay, so those directions sucked. How about this

1 - Simultaneously cook pasta, prepare broth (open cans, dissolve bouillon, etc), cook chicken and microwave-steam veggies
2 - Add all of the above into a large pot
3 - Spice, cover and simmer

ENJOY!

PS - this time the soup is PERFECT. Last time, not so much. The culprit? Making sure to use enough spices. That's why I kinda went balls out this time. It worked - I haven't even put the tupperware full into the fridge because I just keep eating more.