Travel musings and chicken soup

As I write this I am sitting at Istanbul airport, it’s 05h54 in the morning in South Africa. I am as well as I could be, considering we were fed breakfast at 03h45 in the morning on our flight.

I am usually a big fan of aeroplane food. There is something exciting about all the little packages. To most people this seems weird, but I think the reason for my enthusiasm is the fact that mostly when I’m on a long flight I’m off somewhere exciting. This, coupled with the fact that I am blown away when I think of the logistics involved in getting thousands of these meals served in mostly a reasonably edible state, hot, thousands of meters up in the air.

That said, last night’s dinner was one of my more disappointing meals.

I am now staring a 9 hour layover in the face and feeling less than enthusiastic about the food court I saw earlier. My tummy needs gentle, light and soothing food today. I would kill for a bowl of the kiddies chicken and veg soup I trained last week. It uses the simplest ingredients and seasoning and even though it was created with young kids in mind, it is perfect for simple adult comfort food too. I want some… oh, it’s only 06h08 in the morning… and I’m not anywhere near home cooking… will have to just live vicariously through the recipe below then.

Creamy chicken and veg soup

Serves 6

2 Tbsp of olive oil
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2 medium carrot, diced into small pieces

1 litre of good chicken stock

400g tin of coconut milk
½ tsp of dried thyme leaves

200g of chicken breast or deboned thigh, cut into small pieces
100g frozen peas (petit pois)
200g of frozen sweetcorn
salt and pepper to taste

Fry the onion in the oil for about 5 minutes.  Add the carrot, stock, coconut milk and thyme and simmer for 5 minutes or until the carrot softens.  Add the chicken, peas and sweet corn and simmer for a further 5 minutes. 

Season with a little salt and pepper.