My chicken noodle soup has three crucial attributes: garlicky, spicy, and salty.  So I started with four huge cloves of this:

And took a look at what veggies I had in my fridge to give this soup some heartiness.  Turns out I had some leftover leeks, and collard greens.  Works for me.  

This was an urgently necessary soup so I didn’t even bother with sauteeing the onions and garlic in the pot beforehand — I just threw the chopped garlic, leeks, and chicken in a big soup pot and got them boiling in some water, to start with, and added some of my frozen homemade chicken stock.

To satisfy the hot and spicy craving that I get when I really can’t taste anything else, I grated in some ginger, added a few squirts of Sriracha, and even a couple spoonfulls of red curry paste, realizing that despite the main veggie being collard greens, this soup was taking on a somewhat Asian flair.  

After about 45 minutes of this all simmering together, I salted it to taste, threw in the chopped collard greens, and half a package of ruffle-y egg noodles, which I keep on hand specifically for the occasion that I, or a friend that I can make this soup for, gets sick.  

I continued to let the soup simmer until the noodles were fully cooked, ladled out a huge bowl, ate it with some crackers while I caught up on my own blog reading, and then promptly passed out.