I don’t have many skills in life. I can bang out a novel and if you give me a full freezer and a huge beef joint that was half price in Sainsbury’s, I will magically make room in the full freezer for it, and I can make chicken soup.

I’m not even going to be modest about it. My chicken soup is awesome. It cures colds, heals hurt hearts, I don’t doubt that it could bring about world peace. It really is that good. People who don’t even like me that much will vouch for it. Originally, it was my mother’s recipe and before that it was my grandmother’s recipe and I’ve honed it over the years, added to it, taken away until I got it just right. Now I’m sharing it with you because it’s snowing outside and I’m quite a nice person.

Be warned, this is quite labour intensive, not anything on Heston Blumenthal, but it’s definitely a slow cook. Ideally, you want to make it a day in advance.

THE BEST CHICKEN SOUP IN THE WORLD

INGREDIENTS

One large red onion

Five good sized cloves of garlic

One whole, skinned chicken, ideally a bowling fowl, but a roaster will do, or you can use chicken quarters/thighs, but you want it on the bone. Removing the skin is a faff, and don’t worry about doing it perfectly (the wings are a bugger) but it needs to come off, otherwise the soup is WAY too fatty and spoils the flavour. You also need to remove the fat around the top cavity.

Leeks – 500 grammes

Four carrots

The inner stalks and heart of a bunch of celery (DO NOT MISS THIS OUT!)

3 Telma Chicken Stock Cubes (available from Amazon or the kosher section of the supermarket)

White wine

Two sachets of bouquet garni

Salt

Mixed herbs – dried is fine

Sugar

Chicken stock – optional (I always have chicken stock in the fridge or the freezer, but that’s me for you! It doesn’t matter if you don’t.)

One really bigass saucepan!

* Lightly sauté the onion and garlic in olive oil in your big, old pan.

• Then add the chicken, turning it so it browns.

• Meanwhile start chopping up all your veggies, adding them gradually so they have a chance to reduce down before you add some more.

* Then add some white wine, a good sized third of a bottle of whatever you have in the fridge! And chicken stock if you have it.

• Add boiling hot water, enough to completely cover everything. You must keep this water level topped up.

• Then add the bouquet garni (I put one inside the chicken too) and the crushed stock cubes.

• Add a teaspoon of sugar. Don’t ask why, just do it and then a good whack of salt. *

* Leave the pan on a slow simmer for two hours (pressure cookers are for pussies,) making sure to skim the fat off the top every thirty minutes. (Some people don’t bother and put the finished soup in the fridge overnight so it’s easier to remove the fat in the morning, but I prefer to skim as I go, because the unctuous fat masks the flavour of the soup.)

* Keep adding water and salt as needed. You might need to add more wine, stock cubes or bouquet garni at your own discretion. You’re aiming for a salty, savoury, clear but quite dark broth. Umami, if you will!

* It’s done once the chicken starts sliding off the bones.

There’s enough here for at least ten bowls of soup that should be a full meal in themselves. Only decant exactly what you need each time and heat it up in a smaller pan with a bit of extra water and salt, if needed. And it freezes beautifully.

When I want something thicker and more rustic, I add mushrooms and barley.

Now if you’re me, you’ll take the discarded chicken fat, render it down into schmaltz and make either kneidlach or a savoury lokshen pudding to go with the soup. But you’re not me so some vermicelli, or angel hair pasta, or even some thick posh pasta will do.

If you do want a really good Jewish cookbook, bypass Claudia Roden and buy The New International Jewish Cookbook by Evelyn Rose A lot of the Jewish food I make are from recipes I learned in the kitchen on a Friday afternoon, but anything I’ve forgotten, I can always trust Evelyn Rose to nudge my memory.

So, that’s my chicken soup. But it is hard work and I do have a quicker alternative that isn’t the same for sheer love and flavour but it will do at a pinch.

CHEAT’S CHICKEN SOUP

INGREDIENTS

Leftover roast chicken

Packet of kosher chicken soup. Has to be kosher. Only Jewish peeps can make a decent chicken packet soup. I prefer Osem Chicken Noodle soup but it’s very hard to get hold of. Telma Chicken Soup Mix or Telma Chicken Noodle Soup Mix will do at a pinch.

Make the soup as per the directions.

Add leftover chicken.

Eat, enjoy! What do you mean, you’re not hungry? You must be hungry…