Basic Chicken Soup

This simple and delicious soup makes an easy base for a week or two of meals for your dogs and cats.  Dogs are easy to please with other types of meat, starches, fruits and vegetables but cats, in particular, love chicken.

MetPet.com staff
This soup is fine on its own but is made more filling and useful when enriched with bits and pieces of food you have in the fridge.  For dogs without weight issues, you can add a bit of starch in the form of rice, potatoes, pasta or even bread.  It is best to keep homemade meals simple since the best part of fresh foods is limiting ingredients to just what you want.

A small amount of acid is used to leach more calcium from the bones. Apple cider vinegar, lemon or lime juice works very well.

You can make this fresh once a week and store it in the refrigerator or place it into an ice cube tray for small pets or freezer bags/containers for larger ones.

Warm soup is nice when the weather is cold.  It can also be appetizing when senior or ill pets are having eating issues. If you feed kibble, warming it with a few tablespoons of soup can make the meal richer and more appetizing.


Ingredients: 

1 whole fresh chicken with skin removed cut into large pieces
-or-
2 large chicken breasts with skin removed, cut into large pieces
-or-
a large package of chicken thighs with skin removed

2 large carrots peeled and diced
salad greens, parsley, celery or other seasonal greens roughly chopped

1/2 c Apple Cider Vinegar or juice from half a lemon or lime

1. Add the ingredients to a stock pot on the stovetop or slow cooker and add just enough water to cover everything. 

2.  Bring to a boil over high heat, cover and simmer over very low heat for 2 hours.  If the water boils off, add more hot water. 

3. Remove from heat and allow to cool completely. 

4. If the chicken was particularly fatty there may be a layer of fat that can be skimmed off the top of the cooled soup.  Fat is one of the three major food groups (along with protein and carbohydrates) and it is quite beneficial but some pets are unable to eat large quantities of fatty foods especially if they are not used to it.

Remove the chicken from the pot onto a plate and let cool.  Pull all of the chicken off the bones. This process goes easily, with minimal mess if you use disposable gloves. Discard the bones very carefully so that your pet cannot eat them, chop or shred the chicken and return the meat to the soup.