Coconut Chicken Soup

This is another great leftovers meal that makes a fantastic lunch and a filling, economical dinner.

I make this with leftover chicken or turkey, and both taste great. If you have no leftovers, you could cook some chicken breasts or thighs and then shred the meat to make this instead.

This recipe is AIP compliant.

If we are eating this as a main course meal, I like to serve these with a starchy side or a side-salad. I will often use a simple green salad dressed with a lemon-juice vinagrette, but sometimes I will make plantain muffins or tostones or other starchy sides.

This is a perfect meal for a cold winter night and even better because it uses up a lot of leftovers. And all the ingredients are AIP approved as well which is a bonus because it does not aggravate my autoimmune conditions.

Don’t be tempted to leave out the garlic, lemongrass or ginger – they give this soup it’s wonderful flavour and aroma. I buy whole lemongrass stalks and they cost me around $0.44 for 2…

Coconut Chicken Soup

serves 4-6

1½lb leftover cooked chicken (or 2lb chicken breast or thighs – cooked)
sea salt
1 tbsp coconut oil
1 onion – finely chopped
8oz mushrooms – sliced
2 cups greens (use kale, chard or spinach depending on preference) – shredded
1 stalk of lemongrass
2 tbsp grated root ginger
2 cloves garlic – peeled
1 can coconut milk (ensure that it contains nothing but coconut and water – no gums, fillers or emulsifiers)
3-4 cups chicken bone broth
2 tbsp fish sauce (try to find one that only contains AIP ingredients – fish, salt and water)
1 lime – zest and juice
1 bunch green onions – sliced
1 kefir lime leaf – sliced as thinly as you can
¼ cup basil – sliced (use thai basil if you can find it, regular basil will work fine though)
¼ cup cilantro – chopped

If not using leftover chicken, you need to cook your chicken thighs/breasts. I suggest you poach them in the bone broth, then remove, cool, and shred, discarding any bones and skin (save those to add to bone broth in the future – store in the freezer until you have enough).

If using leftover chicken, shred the cold chicken finely, discarding any bones and skin and saving as above to make bone broth.

Melt the coconut oil in a pan and add the mushrooms and onion and cook gently until tender and the mushrooms are starting to look translucent.

Meanwhile, take the lemongrass stalk and cut of the dry woody end. Using a meat tenderizer, a mallet or a rolling pin, bash the heck out of this sucker. You want to break down as many fibers as you can as this will release the flavour. Slice it thinly. Now put the beaten up and sliced lemon grass in your blender with the garlic and ginger and 1 cup of the bone broth. Blend until there are no large chunks.

Once the mushrooms and onions are tender, add the lemongrass/broth mixture to the pan along with the rest of the broth and the can of coconut milk. Taste and adjust seasonings.. Simmer gently for around 30 minutes. Now add your shredded chicken and greens and simmer for 5 minutes to allow the chicken to heat through and the greens to wilt..

Stir in the lime zest and juice, fish sauce, lime zest and juice, basil and cilantro. Taste again and adjust the seasonings one final time.