Brain Drain Soup

I recently made the best soup ever. Even Stephen said so, who I think is a really great cook. He even emailed me at work the next day to tell me how great dinner was, which I thought was pretty big time.

This soup came about in the most unusual way. I was trying to be creative with some left over rotisserie chicken from Publix. I saw this episode on the Food Network on how to make a great soup using egg noddles and chicken, so I thought I would give it a try.

Since I already had the egg noodles, I stopped by Publix to pick up a couple things: chicken broth and a can of peas (this fit perfectly into our budget and I was really proud).

I got home, I remembered I had used the egg noodles in a pasta dish last week. (dang! don't you hate when you do that?) When unpacking the grocery bag, I realized I actually grabbed 2 cans of garlic chicken broth and the can of peas I picked up was actually the kind with onion and mushrooms - not what I had intended. This was a case of the baby brain drain.

Jamie and I often talk about this problem. It's when the baby drains your brain power and you can't remember what you were going to say or forget why you were walking into the guest bedroom. It seems to happen more frequently when prego - I think Adler is going to be really smart because I often feel really dumb - so hopefully that means he's getting all the brain cells right now. I'm pretty sure this is a medical fact, by the way.

Anyways, it was time to get creative in the kitchen - if all else fails, order pizza. So, I put on a pot of boiling garlic chicken broth, added torn pieces of the rotisserie chicken, added a strained can of the pea/onion/mushroom mixture and got things boiling. I realized I really needed a starch to go in the soup - noodles would have been perfect! All we had was a box of kous kous. I love kous kous (was introduced to it by our friends, the Vogeltanz) so I figured it couldn't hurt - so I poured about half the box in. It all looked pretty good. I decided to add cut up pieces of steamed carrots from the night before. This added great color. Stephen was in for quite a soup surprise!

I gave it a taste test - pretty good! Not as garlicy and I had anticipated. Dinner was ready! Stephen and I sat down in our usual spot - the couch - and dinner was served. Stephen looked at the soup with suspecting eyes. I pretended not to notice. He moved his spoon around, trying to be complementary and said, "Mmmmm....porridge!"

Okay, I know it was a bit thick (probably should have put in less kous kous), but I had to laugh. The last time I heard the word porridge was watching the movie "Oliver". What the heck is porridge anyways??

Well, to make this already long story short, he took a couple bites and was sold! I actually have plans to make my Brain Drain Soup this week (by request!). So, ladies, if you are looking for a cheap way to surprise and feed your husband, try my special soup. It was a hit in the Hunton house! Enjoy!