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Get Well Soon Chicken Soup paleo recipe-min

Recipe: Get Well Soon Chicken Soup

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Feeling a bit crummy? Chances are, you find yourself feeling under the weather much less than you ever did before you started eating Paleo – but on those rare days that you do, nothing says ‘get well soon’ like a steaming hot bowl of chicken soup. It’s the ultimate comfort food, and boiling the whole bird means it is chocked full of vitamins, minerals, and of course – gelatin. Even if you’re not ill, I highly recommend you make some of this!

Recipe: Get Well Soon Chicken Soup
 
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Recipe type: Soups
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
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Ingredients
  • 1 x 1.5kg chicken
  • 2 tbsp red wine vinegar
  • 3 onions, roughly chopped
  • 1 bulb fennel, roughly chopped
  • 6 carrots, peeled and roughly chopped
  • 6 cloves garlic, peeled
  • 4 bay leaves
  • Few sprigs fresh thyme
  • Few sprigs fresh rosemary
  • A large handful fresh parsley
  • Sea salt and black pepper
Instructions
  1. Wash your chicken, before putting it into your biggest stock pot. Fill the pot with cold water, just enough to cover the bird, before adding the red wine vinegar. Bring to the boil, then leave to simmer for 45 minutes. Skim the froth from the top, before removing the chicken.
  2. When the chicken is cool enough to handle, shred all the meat from the bird using a fork. It may not be completely cooked through yet – this is perfectly normal.
  3. Return the chicken carcass to the stock pot, and add the onions, fennel, carrots, garlic and herbs (except the parsley). Return to the heat, cover and simmer for another couple of hours.
  4. minutes before serving, return the shredded chicken back to the soup. When fully cooked through, serve in soup bowls garnished with the fresh parsley.

What's the secret to your favourite chicken soup recipe? Is it a dish you often make?

Get Well Soon Chicken Soup paleo recipe-min

Un-Paleo Hospital Food primal diet-min

Un-Paleo Hospital Food

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One of my favourite blogs is Notes from a Hospital Bed, which was started by a journalist during a long stay in a UK hospital. You won't be surprised to hear that he wasn't served Paleo Hospital Food!

The blogger was shocked about the food he was served each day, so took photos and posted them on his blog.

 Hospital-Food-min
Images by Notes From A Hospital Bed

In hospital good nutrition is obviously paramount to enable patients to recover and regain strength. Hospitals obviously don't serve Paleo food (but hopefully in  the not too distant future they will?), but even by Conventional Wisdom the food served in hospital leaves a lot to be desired.

When I had a short stay in hospital a couple of years ago I found it very hard to navigate the food options. Everything on offer was geared towards a low-fat agenda. The other key principle was that all of the food was quick and easy to prepare – and had long shelf lives. This meant everything was pre-packaged along with lots of undesirable ingredients.

I really feel for people in hospital – at the time they need good nutrition the most, they are all too often being given sub-standard food.

If you've been in hospital, what was the food like? Were you able to keep it Paleo? Perhaps one day there will be a Paleo Hospital Food option?

Un-Paleo Hospital Food primal diet-min

Paleo Cold & Flu Remedies primal diet health sickness-min

Paleo Cold & Flu Remedies

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Since I've been following a Paleo diet, I thought catching Cold & Flu were a thing of the past. But, sadly no; I've just got over my first cold in over two years. I recovered far quicker and felt nothing like as bad as I had in my pre-paleo days, but it was frustrating to feel ill all the same.

The winter before I went Paleo, I seemed to catch every virus going around. I permanently had a cold or the flu – and felt terrible. So perhaps I shouldn't complain about feeling a bit run down for a few days, once every two or three years.

Doesn't Paleo prevent you from getting Cold & Flu?

I think Paleo plays a crucial role in building up a good immune system; but sometimes this isn't enough. After a few hectic weeks at work, insufficient sleep, the arrival of Winter (seriously reducing my daily sunshine/ Vitamin D exposure), I suspect my immune system didn't put up the usual fight when confronted with a cold virus. A trip to an extremely cold Canberra was the final battle that my immune system lost.

Paleo Cold Remedies?

I'm really against over the counter medicines, so at the first hint of a sore throat, I immediately researched natural cold cures and remedies.

The most important things are the simplest; lots of sleep and good hydration. I also made a big pot of chicken soup which is not only very nutritious, but it is also warming and soothing for a sore throat.

Vitamin D levels are crucial; I'm usually very sporadic in taking it, so I've been making sure I take Vitamin D3 capsules every day. I don’t usually supplement with Vitamin C, but almost everything I researched on remedies mentioned it, so I started taking it too.

I don’t usually have sweeteners, but I found hot lemon water with raw honey very soothing. I read a lot of people add in cayenne pepper and ginger, but that was a step to far for me. As was raw garlic or gargling with Apple Cider Vinegar.

They say prevention is better than cure…

I've definitely learnt my lesson. I'm going to be far more careful to keep my Vitamin D levels up, especially in Winter (I must book another test to check what my levels are). I'm not going to compromise on sleep – and Canberra, sorry – but I don’t think I’ll be visiting again until Spring.

Have you noticed a decrease (or hopefully absence) in Cold & Flu since you changed your diet? If you've got any Cold & Flu remedies or cures, please pass them on in the comments below, you might just help someone somewhere feel a lot better!

Paleo Cold & Flu Remedies primal diet health sickness-min