Easy Chicken Noodle Soup

I've been sick for several days, and craving really good....non-canned....chicken noodle soup. After discussing with Hil-girl (my mom) how she makes her soup (it takes roughly 2 hours) i decided to use inspiration from hers to create my own that takes 20 minutes, rather than 2 hours. It was cheap, it was easy, and it has lasted me a couple days and is really, really great.

INGREDIENTS

-2 cans of Swanson chicken broth

-2 or 3 celery stalks

-2 whole carrots

-1 large yellow onion

-4 Mushrooms of any kind

-Whole grain rotini noodles

-1 cup of water

-salt

-pepper

-fresh dill

-1 or 2 chicken breasts

You could make this soup if you've never made anything before in your life. Get a nice sized pot and fill it with 2 cans of broth, a 1/2 cup of soup, the chopped up celery, chopped up carrot, mushrooms sliced in 1.2, and your onion just sliced in 1/2.

Bring to a boil, and then let simmer.

In a pan, cook your chicken until it is browned and white on the inside. cut it into chunks, slices, or however you like it. Drop the chicken into the pot.

Meanwhile, have some whole wheat rotini cooking. Once it is softened throw it into the pot. Bring everything back to a boil, and then back to a simmer. Let it sit on a simmer for 10 to 15 minutes.

Enjoy.

Butter Is Better...

Butter is better. It just is. No, stop....really.....there is no argument, no time for rebuttal, nada. Tonight I treated my gal pals to a nice pasta dish and a veggie salad. This is what I did for this pasta dish:

-Wide Noodle Amish Pasta (it looked good, it cost little, and I like a wider pasta when I am also using something heavy like a protein in the dish--good tip, helps balance it out I think)

-Cherry tomatoes (yum....and they add a nice acidity)

-Basil leaves

-Medium sized shrimp (I bought a big ole' bag of pre-cooked and de-shelled. They are certainly not as mouth watering as the real deal....but you get a lot of bang for ya buck....and lord knows any extra cash I have in college isn't going towards finer proteins....)

-A sprinkle of capers (not too many, they add a hint in this dish--by no means the star)

-A dash of chili powder, a lot of regular pepper, and some salt

-Extra Virgin Olive Oil

-As much squeezed lemon juice as desired

-BUTTER!!!!!!

Why is butter so great you may ask? Well, this anecdote should answer that burning question. All 5 of my lovely guests asked me what I did to make "such an amazing sauce". And, all it was was E.V.O.O. (Please don't judge me for the Rachel Ray allusion...........) and a heeeeaaaaavy hand of good ole' fashioned butter. Margarine would be downright disgusting, and an insult to dinner in general. Butter gives most dishes a richness and mouth-watering complexity that any healthier products can simply not mimic.

And no, I don't measure.....this is why I do not bake, and I likely inherited this inability and aversion from my mother....and my lack of math skills.

Any hoot--the reason this simple pasta dish tasted so fanastic was that I used a ton of butter. Is it good to consume a ton of butter all the time? Certainly not. But, in the name of taste and all things good in life--try using it as much as possible. Clearly, I am not a dietetics and nutrition major.......(they're probably all hungry anyway)