Ajiaco con pollo (Colombian chicken and potato soup)

It's a perfect day for soup: a cold rainy Sunday in December, just after Christmas.  Today I'm trying to recreate my significant other's mother's recipe for ajiaco con pollo.  This chicken and potato soup is a hearty staple of the capital city in Colombia, from whence my beloved Leo originated.  In doing some quick online research, most recipes refer to the soup simply as ajiaco, and there are several variations of the recipe.  I have decided to follow the notes that Leo took down while helping his mom to make the soup and try for an authentic Bogotan feel.  One variation from these notes is that I am using cubed butternut squash instead of pumpkin (In the frozen aisle at the grocery store: "I don't see any pumpkin." "Well here's some butternut squash, do you think that would work?" "Yes! I love butternut squash!" Case closed.). 

The staple ingredient which "makes" the soup is papa criolla amarilla, or yellow creole potatoes.  These small yellow potatoes are very sweet and have a creamy texture, and dissolve into the soup.  Like all potatoes, they are of Andean descent and are considered one of the best in Colombia.  They may be available at fancier food stores, at Latin groceries, and online.

Ingredients

-3 lbs chicken breasts, trimmed of fat and sliced in half lengthwise
-one small to medium sized garlic bulb, peeled and crushed
-one medium yellow onion, peeled and halved
-1 lb papa criolla amarilla
-4 large red potatoes, skin on, cubed
-1/2 lb frozen cubed butternut squash or pumpkin
-8 mini extra-sweet corn cobs
-one bunch green onions
-1 chicken bouillon cube
-1 bay leaf
-salt, to taste
-capers
-rice, cooked separately
-fried plantains
-can also be served with avocado, sour cream, and spicy aji


Begin by combining the chicken, onion, garlic, bay leaf, bouillon cube, and salt in 8-10 cups of cold water (you can always add more if need be).  I'm using my All-clad stockpot.  Heat all of the ingredients over low heat until they come to a boil.

    Meanwhile, cube your red potatoes.  Once the soup boils, remove the onion.  Add the red potatoes and the corn cobs and return to a boil.  When you can easily pierce the red potatoes with a fork, add the papa criolla amarilla and the butternut squash.  Allow the chicken to cook thoroughly, then remove, shred (with forks or hands), and return it to the soup.  Simmer gently, stirring occasionally, until the soup thickens to the desired texture.  Just before serving, slice up your green onions and toss into the soup for a little bit of crunchy texture and bright taste.  Serve the soup with rice and fried plantains on the side, and add capers as per personal preference to each bowl.  This is a superbly savory and comforting soup with a simple execution.   

See also: Ajiaco: Colombian Chicken and Potato Soup (Serious Eats)

Hearty Chicken Soup

It's a chilly October morning, and Andrew, my significant other, is suffering from one of the many autumn viruses going around.  As it happens, I know the perfect cure- chicken soup (and decongestant).  I was also looking for an excuse to make a soup that isn't usually on my menu.  I looked at a few recipes for ideas, including in my Cook's Illustrated: The New Best Recipe cookbook.  I really do love my Cook's Illustrated cookbook, but sometimes they get a little too scientific for me.  I also didn't feel up to the task of making my own chicken stock- as much as I enjoy cooking (and eating the results), I didn't want to be in the kitchen all day.  I finally went with one of the Pioneer Woman's recipes as a base, although I did change it up a bit.

I chose chicken thighs over a whole chicken for several reasons.  Working with a whole chicken is unwieldy, whereas smaller bits are easier to deal with.  Dark meat (to me, anyway) is more tender, more flavorful, and far more juicy.  I knew I was going to get a very rich broth from all of those thighs.  If you choose to follow my lead, you do want the skin-on and bone-in thighs, as both skin (high in fat) and bone (delicious marrow flavor) contribute a lot to the end product.  Another bonus: chicken thighs are much cheaper to buy than a whole chicken.  I must give credit to Andrew for pointing all of these things out even through a congested haze, because I was originally going to just buy what all of the other recipes had suggested.  I used roughly three or four pounds of chicken thighs and saved two for Andrew to make his famous chicken sandwiches.

I'm sure you would like to know what the rest of the ingredients are:

-10 ounces Swanson's unsalted chicken broth
-1 large turnip, peeled and chopped into bite-size pieces
-4 whole carrots, sliced
-4 celery ribs, chopped
-2 small onions or 1 large onion, diced
-1 cup uncooked barley
-1 tbsp cumin
-dash of oregano
-bundle of fresh herbs (in this case thyme, sage, and basil) tied together with cooking twine
-4 cloves fresh garlic, crushed
-1 bay leaf
-enough water to cover all ingredients if broth does not prove to be enough liquid to do so

One ingredient that I would have liked to add is ground black pepper, and there is a quite simple explanation for why there is not any present: I forgot to pick up more whilst out shopping.  It is always a terrible feeling as one drives away from the store and remembers that they forgot something rather crucial.  However, this soup proves that one does not need black pepper to create an amazingly comforting and delicious soup.  I would also like to point out that there is NO added salt- none whatsoever, and it was not missed.

I briefly toyed with the idea of roasting the vegetables to bring out more flavor, but was feeling so lazy as to not even saute them in the stockpot first.  I simply put everything except the barley into the pot, covered it all with a combination of chicken broth and water, and gave it a stir.  After the soup came to a boil, I turned the heat down to a simmer, and let the simmering liquid do its magic for two hours.  At this point, I removed the chicken thighs with a slotted spoon, as well as the bundle of fresh herbs, which was disintegrating.  If the chicken is not yet tender enough where the skin is falling off of the meat and the meat is falling off of the bone, it needs more time.  I set the chicken aside to cool down to the point where I could remove the meat from the bone by hand, and added my cup of barley to the still simmering vegetables and broth.  It takes 45 minutes for the barley to be ready, and that is plenty of time for the chicken to cool down and for me to separate the meat from the skin and bones.  I shredded the chicken meat into nice bite-sized chunks and put it back into the soup.  Once the barley was ready (it expands to several times its original size, and ought to be only slightly chewy), the soup was done.  Despite my avoidance of doing anything extra fancy with the ingredients, it turned out to be one of the tastiest soups that I have ever made.