13 March, 2021
Chicken Soup with chicken meatballs/ Polpettine in Brodo di Pollo
Brodo (literally broth or soup) is one of those comfort foods…hot and tasty…ideal on cold days and a perfect meal! My mother would often make brodo on a Saturday night for dinner. This was sometimes chicken based and other times beef based. Brodo is multi-purpose. She would make it whenever someone wasn’t feeling well, or even just in case you might become unwell. Recently she received her first Covid vaccine. When I called to ask how it went and how she was feeling, she said fine, because she had come home immediately after and made herself some pastina in brodo!
Another tradition of hers (I don’t know why) is to make it whenever someone returns home from a long journey (for example a transatlantic flight from Italy). She still does this today. Whenever I fly to Calabria for a visit…even in the heat of summer…I can count on a nice bowl of brodo!
My favorite is her chicken soup with little chicken meatballs.
Ingredients for Soup/Brodo:
- 1 or 2 pieces of chicken (for example split chicken breast with ribs)
- one medium onion
- ~1/2 celery stalk with leaves
- 1 small plum tomato
- a couple of sprigs fresh Italian parsley
- 1 small carrot cut into about 1-inch pieces (optional)
- Pecorino cheese rind
Place chicken in a saucepan covered with water on medium-high heat. Bring it to a boil and skim off the foamy layer which comes up to the top. Lower the heat to medium – low and add one whole peeled onion, a half a celery stalk including leaves, a tomato (give it a good squeeze as you place it in the water) a couple sprigs fresh Italian parsley, 1 carrot cut into about 1-inch pieces and allow it to cook down/simmer. After a little bit add the cheese rind (scrape off the wax with a knife). My mother prefers pecorino cheese (which is what I used) but I’ve seen Parmigiano cheese rinds also available at the supermarket.
While this continues to cook make the meatballs.
Ingredients for Chicken Meatballs:
- 1 pound ground chicken
- black pepper – 1 or 2 pinches (be light with the pepper you don’t want it to overpower the mild flavor of the chicken)
- 1 clove of garlic cut up into little pieces or crushed with a garlic press (same as with the black pepper, one clove is enough as you don’t want the strong flavor of the garlic to overpower the mild flavor of the chicken)
- salt to taste
- 1/4 cup grated pecorino cheese
- 1/4 cup breadcrumbs
- 1 egg
- a few sprigs chopped fresh Italian parsley
Use your hands to mix all the ingredients. Take one small meatball and place it in the pot with the soup simmering on the stove and allow it to cook; then take it out for a taste test (to see if it has enough salt to your liking; if not sprinkle a little more salt in the mixture and keep testing until you get it just right). Once you are happy with that roll the meat mixture into little meatballs (about the size of a nickel) add them to the broth after it has been evaporated a bit. Allow them to cook through.
Cook whatever pasta you will combine with the broth according to the instructions on the package. I used pastina, but my mother would use whatever she had on hand (pastina, ditalini, small soup shells, even spaghetti broken up into smaller pieces). Once the pasta is cooked drain it and add it back to its pot and then ladle the soup with the meatballs into the pasta and combine…being careful not to include the vegetables and piece(s) of chicken used to make the soup. Serve in soup bowls and enjoy!
The chicken that was used to make the soup can be eaten as a second course if you like. More importantly the pecorino cheese rind can be eaten too. My oldest brother and I would fight over who could eat the cheese rind! It melts as it cooks in the soup while still retaining its shape and is delicious!
