Alright, so today I’m gonna yap about my attempt at recreating Eat’n Park’s Soup of the Day. I saw some folks online raving about it, so I figured, “Why the heck not?”
First things first, I hit up Google. I searched for “Eat’n Park Soup of the Day recipe,” and wouldn’t you know it, a bunch of copycat recipes popped up. I skimmed through a few, looking for one that seemed simple enough for my cooking skills (or lack thereof).
The recipe I landed on called for chicken broth, some veggies (carrots, celery, onion – the usual suspects), cooked chicken, and a few other odds and ends like butter and flour for thickening. Sounded easy peasy, right? Wrong.
I started by chopping up the veggies. Now, I’m no chef, so my knife skills are… questionable. Let’s just say the carrots were more like carrot chunks than neat little dices. Oh well, rustic is in, right?
Next, I melted some butter in a pot and sautéed the veggies until they were softened. The recipe said to cook them until translucent, but honestly, I just winged it. They looked kinda soft, so I figured that was good enough.
Then came the fun part: adding the chicken broth. I poured in a carton of that stuff, brought it to a boil, and then simmered it for a while. The recipe said to simmer it for at least 30 minutes, but I got impatient after about 20. I mean, come on, I was hungry!
While the soup was simmering, I shredded some cooked chicken. I bought a rotisserie chicken from the grocery store because ain’t nobody got time to cook chicken from scratch for soup. I mean, seriously.
Once the soup had simmered for (almost) long enough, I added the shredded chicken. I also added a little bit of flour mixed with water to thicken it up. This is where things started to get a little dicey.
I whisked the flour mixture into the soup, but it started to clump up. I panicked for a second, but then I just kept whisking like a maniac. Eventually, the clumps dissolved, and the soup actually started to thicken. Score!
Finally, I seasoned the soup with salt and pepper. I tasted it, and it was… okay. It wasn’t exactly Eat’n Park Soup of the Day, but it wasn’t terrible either. It tasted like chicken soup, which is basically what it was.
I served myself a bowl and ate it while watching TV. It was a decent meal, and it definitely hit the spot on a chilly evening. Would I make it again? Maybe. But next time, I might just go to Eat’n Park and let them do the cooking.
- Chopped veggies (kinda poorly)
- Sautéed veggies in butter (until kinda soft)
- Simmered in chicken broth (for not quite 30 minutes)
- Added shredded rotisserie chicken (because lazy)
- Thickened with flour mixture (and almost failed)
- Seasoned with salt and pepper (the basics)
So yeah, that was my Eat’n Park Soup of the Day adventure. Not a total disaster, but not exactly a culinary masterpiece either. Just a simple, homemade soup that did the trick.
Lessons Learned:
- Maybe I should invest in a knife skills class.
- Patience is a virtue, especially when simmering soup.
- Rotisserie chicken is a lifesaver.
