Chicken Pastina

Since it's the season of the plague, I figured I'd shared a recipe that will batten down the hatches and keep your victims fed. So far, it has kept those in my house suffering the sickness from turning into zombies. (Note: This recipe does not guarantee safety from the Walking Dead.)

This recipe is also an homage to the memory of my Aunt Jay. Aunt Jay was notorious for, when any of her neices and nephews were ill, ensuring they got a jar of homemade pastina. Pastina soup is really just tiny pasta - either acini de pepe or sterlina - boiled in chicken broth. It was nothing special, and yet it was everything special. This one's for you, Jay-Jay.

Chicken Sterlina Soup
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
3 boxes Progresso Chicken Broth
2 ribs celery, diced
4 carrots, diced
2 cups green peas
1 small box Sterlina pasta (the little stars!) or Acini de Pepe
1tsp chicken boullion
1 cup diced onion/shallots
2tbsp cheap white wine
4 tbsp butter
1 tbsp flour
Herb de Provence
Poultry Seasoning
Emeril's Essence
Salt
* All seasonings to taste, there's no real method to my madness
2 Bay Leaf

Directions:

1. Roast chicken breasts, sprinkled with seasonings of choice in the oven at 350 for 45 minutes to an hour, or until cooked through. Let cool, and then shred, slice, dice - however you want the chicken to be in the soup.
2. Meanwhile, get out your heavy soup pot (if you don't have one, get one) and melt the butter. Mix the wine, seasonings to taste, and onion or shallots. When the onions and shallots are clear and well mixed with the wine and butter, add the flour to make a roux. Let cook for one minute more. Whisk the broth slowly into the pot in a steady stream.
3. Add the vegetables,chicken and bay leaves and bring to a full boil; cover and let simmer on low for about 30 minutes or until the vegetables are tender.
4. Add the peas. Add the pastina, bringing it to a full boil again. Boil for fifteen minutes. Put the pot in the middle of the table and let the savages go wild.

Serves: 6-8, maybe more.