This recipe is a combination of the best of ingredients Peggy and I found from Internet recipes or added based on our own knowledge of soups. It is a sure winner. Peggy made it and we loved it. You will too.

You will notice the ingredients list calls for cooked chicken. The reason is that boiling raw chicken breasts, etc., will yield a cruddy white muck on top of whatever liquid is used. You don't want that stuff in your soup.

Thus, I recommend simmering two hefty boneless, skinless chicken breasts in lightly salted boiling water for half an hour, then rinsing the breasts in cold water and then dicing them into 1/2" cubes or shredding them with two forks on a wooden cutting board. At that point you are ready to proceed making great Chicken Vegetable Soup.

Ingredients:

3, 14 oz. cans of chicken broth

1 cup of fresh or frozen corn

1, 14 oz. can of kidney beans

1, 14 oz. can of sliced potatoes, drained (or slice a raw one)

2 large celery ribs, diced

2 summer squash, quartered lengthwise and sliced into 1/2 thick pieces

2 large carrots, sliced into 1/4" thick circles

1 sweet red bell pepper, diced

2 cloves of garlic, diced

1 medium to large onion, chopped

1 tsp. of dried basil

1/2 tsp. of dried oregano

1 tsp. of salt

1/2 tsp. of pepper

1, 28 oz. can of diced tomatoes

4 cups of cubed or shredded cooked chicken

3 sprigs of fresh parsley, chopped

Directions:

In a soup pot, combine all of the ingredients except for the tomatoes, chicken and parsley.

Bring the mixture to a boil on high heat.

Reduce the heat to low.

Cover the soup pot with a lid and simmer for 25 minutes.

Stir in the chicken and the tomatoes and simmer for 3 minutes.

Serve the soup using the parsley as a decorative topping.

Each guest can further add salt and pepper as desired.

It is nice to serve this soup with a warmed loaf of sourdough bread or rolls and butter.