Coconut Curry Chicken Soup

Thai cuisine - Looks lengthy, but goes together very quickly. A very hardy soup with fabulous flavor. This recipe was put together by a personal chef who cooks for professional athletes. It is on the regular rotation at our house. I got it from my friend Eve about six years ago, and have been making it regularly since.  Every time we have made it for guests, they have asked for the recipe. It was originally from "Eating Well" magazine, but I have made some changes to simplify, decrease cooking time, and decrease the amount of pans I have to wash afterwards. Definitely a pleaser!

Ingredients

• 1 T canola or olive oil
• ¼ C thinly sliced onion, chopped
• 2 tsp red curry paste (essential – find it in big grocery stores or health food store)
• 1 ½ tsp curry powder
• ½ tsp ground turmeric
• ½ tsp ground coriander
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 6 C chicken broth (can use low fat, low sodium) I use boullion cubes or better than boullion
• 1 (13.5 oz) can light coconut milk (I used regular)
• 2 ½ C shredded cooked chicken breast or turkey (about 1 lb) I usually pre-cook and chop chicken breasts, sprinkling them with salt and pepper after baking. Could use shredded rotisserie chicken or whatever chicken you have on hand.
• ½ C chopped green onions
• 2 T sugar
• ½ C fresh chopped cilantro
• ¼ tsp crushed red pepper OR 4 small hot red chiles, seeded and chopped (I used 1/8 t ground)
• 3 C fresh spinach leaves
• ½ lb snow peas, trimmed and cut in half crosswise (I often omit this b/c I don't have it on hand, could use peas)
• 1 (5 ¾ oz) package pad thai noodles, aka: wide rice noodles (4 packages ramen worked okay in a pinch, but definitely not optimal)
• 7 lime wedges 

Directions:

1.  Heat oil in large pot over medium-high heat. Add onions and the next 5 ingredients (through garlic) to pan; sauté 1 minute, stirring constantly.
2.  Add chicken broth to pot and bring to a boil. Add coconut milk to pan; reduce heat and simmer for five minutes. Add remaining ingredients, except for lime wedges.  Simmer for about three minutes to soften the noodles.
3.  Serve with lime wedges. I like to serve some kind of bread on the side, such as muffins, naan, or peasant bread.

Yield: 7 servings (serving size: 2 cups soup and 1 lime wedge)

A note about some of the more unusual ingredients:  

• The red curry paste is available in the Asian food section of most grocery stores. I have found it at Walmart, Albertsons, and Safeway.
• The pad thai noodles are wide rice noodles. The package that I usually buy looks like this, but any brand is okay.