Thai Chicken Noodle Soup

Even if you don't have much chicken left over, you should still make this. A few shreds will be plenty. (And this recipe is worth bearing in mind even when your starting point is not leftover chicken: if you were to bung in some frozen prawns at the end, making sure you cook them through, this would make for a fabulous storecupboard supper.) This is a very laissez-faire recipe all round, actually: when I cooked it for the photo shoot I forgot to put the vegetables in and it was still heavenly. I did try to make up for my absent-mindedness by giving the tender-shoot stirfry a beauty-shot of its own, so you can see the mixture of pak choi, bok choi, spindly asparagus, Chinese kale, peanut shoots and Chinese chives. But I happily use some leafy greens and a julienned or sliced spring onion along with a handful of beansprouts instead. Similarly, if you can't get the ravishing cellophane packages of almost equally cellophane vermicelli, don't be put off making this; udon, soba, rice noodles, spaghetti or linguine could be substituted. For US cup measures, use the toggle at the top of the ingredients list.

Unbalanced

% Daily Values based on a 2,000 calorie diet