Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup with Lemon

Making homemade consommé is easy to do. And with the homemade stock, you’ll love the flavor of this Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup with Lemon.

My husband is an avid soup eater. Me, not so much. I’m a fan of a few soups. Both are creamy, clam chowder and cream of mushroom soup. Thick hearty soups that fill you up.

Middle Child and my Princess are also fanatical soup eaters, like their dad. All three love my homemade chicken noodle soup and add lemon juice to it. Lots of lemon. Lots and LOTS of lemon.

I have been making a pot of chicken noodle soup for both practically every week for years now. They pack it in their thermoses everyday and enjoy it for lunch, even if the weather is 100ºF outside.

These kiddos would eat soup for breakfast, lunch and dinner – and have been for years. So some weeks I make two or three pots of soup. It’s not just for when you get sick!

So this recipe and post are for them. After making thousands of pots of lemon chicken soup for them, I think you can say I am master at it. So enjoy the recipe.

Homemade or canned stock

I really can’t fathom my kids’ infatuation with chicken noodle soup, but I am thankful for it. I make sure their soup is PACKED with all the good stuff that their growing bodies need.

When I first began making them soup, I also would make it from homemade chicken stock. We always had a roasted chicken carcass from a dinner, and I would make stock from that, with the addition of carrots, celery, onions, garlic, bay leaves and herbs.

I have written a thorough post all about making instant pot bone broth, if you want to go the homemade route for your own soup base.

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But because I make such vast quantities of soup every week, I do not always make my own chicken stock. I just don’t have that kind of time. My secret ingredient is Better Than Bouillon consommé.

This is by far the best tasting chicken stock I have tried and I feel is so much better than canned stock. You can use any stock base you want, just be sure to taste it. The quality of your soup is dependent on the quality of stock you start with.

Why put lemon juice in chicken soup

Adding lemon juice to chicken soup, or any soup, is not a new concept. Adding a bit of acid, like lemon juice or vinegar, to your soup gives your dish a brighter flavor, a little zip for your taste buds.

This holds true with most of the meals you cook. In many Persian soups, we always add a bit of sourness to the pot. Some of the sour options we use is lemon juice, dried Persian limes, sour grapes (gooreh), vinegar and sour cream (kashk).

You certainly don’t have to add as much lemon juice as my kids like in your soup! In the recipe below I recommend starting with ¼ cup of lemon juice for a pot of soup. Feel free to add more if you so choose.

How to make soup hearty

Since my kids are eating soup for lunch, I do my best to make sure that it is hearty and filling for them. Most soups are very liquidy, and broth by itself will not give you enough energy for a full day of learning.

One secret trick I like to add to my chicken noodle is soup to mix in quick cooking oats to thicken my soup. You can also use whole rolled oats, just chop them up into small bits. As the oats cook, it thickens the soup.

I also make sure that my homemade soups are filled with big chunks of chicken, big chunks of vegetables and lots of noodles.

This is THE chicken soup recipe that beats all chicken soup recipes. Because I’ve perfected it after making pot after pot of it, week after week, for over 10 years now.

That’s a whole lotta soup!

PS If you try this recipe, why not leave a star rating in the recipe card right below and/or a review in the comment section further down the page? I always appreciate your feedback.

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