My coworker, Sharon shared her chicken soup recipe with me. Boil chicken legs (quarters) until the meat falls off the bones. Pick out the bones and add potatoes, carrots, onion, celery, scallions, a vegetable bullion cube, thyme, salt and pepper. Simple.

This morning I went to the grocery store and bought the ingredients and decided to add a few others including mushrooms, corn, peas, and pumpkin. First, I blanched the chicken leg quarters, skinned and defatted them. That took forever! There is a lot of fat on chicken legs. Plus, I bought too much of everything and ended up having to make 3 big pots of chicken soup. Then I boiled it for about 2 and a half hours. I picked out the bones and added the vegetables and thyme and decided to omit the bullion because the chicken flavor was already so rich.

Then I made cornbread muffins.

I can’t believe the amount of time it takes to do all this. From leaving the house to grocery shop until now, when the muffins are still baking, it was a good 8 hours! No wonder they say being a housewife is a full time job. In one household, I’d say it is about 2 FTE’s worth of work at least!