A Not Entirely Successful Chicken Soup Experiment

Naturally I had to come down with a head cold last night. Gotta start the school year off right! This means chicken soup. I did not have the usual fixings for chicken soup and have been on a stern "empty the fridge" kick of late, so here's what I hacked together:

3 links hot Italian sausage, cut into chunks
2 chicken breasts (bone and skin on)
6 carrots, chopped
4 sticks of celery, chopped (was using up some old ones)
2 Cubanelle peppers, seeded and chopped
2 large white onions, chopped
6 cloves of garlic, chopped
2 bay leaves
1 cup jerk marinade
3 tbsp paprika
3 tbsp mustard powder
3 tbsp dried cumin powder
1 tbsp dried poultry seasoning
6 crimini mushrooms, quartered
1 quart chicken stock
water (as needed)


Brown the chicken and sausage in a little oil in the bottom of the pan. Remove any excess fat. After the chicken has browned, add the vegetables, save for three cloves of garlic and the mushrooms (which aren't vegetables!), stir up and let them brown. Then add the chicken stock and jerk and allow to cook on low for a while to soften the vegetables a bit. Add water to the desired dilution (at least a quart), add the mushrooms, and allow to simmer for about an hour, until the chicken is cooked. Remove the chicken and peel it from the bone and add the remaining garlic.

I had some tomatoes but decided to leave them out. I'm not sure why but on second thought they would have gone nicely. It was plenty hot, as I recalled from that bottle of jerk. t wasn't quite what I expected because I don't think the Italian sausage melded with the other flavors perfectly. I think it was the fennel but I'm not entirely sure. A more neutral sausage would have been better. It also needs a bit of acid, so I think I'll squeeze and zest a lemon into it for later.

Of course, maybe the discordancy it's because my sense of taste is totally off because of the aforementioned cold?

Update: Upon the addition of some rice vinegar (I skipped the lemon) and a day to mature, it's not bad. I think it could use some work, though.