There’s a reason soup is a staple in developing countries, nursing homes and internment camps: It keeps you alive, it keeps you warm, and it’s as cheap as dirt. Throw table scraps into a pot of hot water, and dinner is served. Soup is the perfect student food.
The central ingredient in any soup is the stock. Canned is relatively expensive and almost always too salty. There are some passable boxed varieties found at frou-frou organic stores. They’re good to have on hand for last-minute whompums, but homemade is far superior.
I usually use half of every batch immediately for soup then store the rest. It can be stored in the fridge for a few days or frozen for months. I recommend freezing it in as many small Ziplocs as necessary, so you don’t have to thaw the whole wad just to use a little bit in a recipe. These can either be thawed in advance or submerged in hot water as needed.
If you’re going to thaw them overnight in the fridge, place them in a bowl. The bags sometimes spring a leak, and you don’t want all that luscious nectar running down into your vegetable crisper.
Chicken stock can be made using either a whole chicken or an assortment of parts. Wings, backs, necks and bones can be specially bought, or collected Dahmer-style.
The only other essential ingredients are carrots, celery, onion, salt and pepper. A head of garlic, a bay leaf, parsley and potatoes are all bonus items, if you can dig them up.
Coarsely chop all ingredients, toss them in the pot with 2 quarts of hot water, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and walk away. The longer you cook it, the richer it gets, but if you are using a whole bird, don’t let it go for much more than a half-hour if you plan on salvaging the meat for chicken salad. If using scraps, let it go for up to two hours, topping off the water as necessary.

Drain and squish out all the flavor. Let the liquid cool overnight, scrape off the fat from the surface — this makes a lovely pomade — and store. Vegetable stock follows the same procedure, but you end up with a much improved, richer stock if you roast the veggies to a deep brown first, anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes. Again, the onions, celery and carrots are the core, with plenty of room for improvisation on the rest. Cook for about an hour. When improvising a soup, keep simplicity in mind. You only need a couple of flavorful ingredients and some sort of filler. The filler can be rice, pasta, potatoes, dumplings, drywall — whatever. All can be cooked right in the stock, and all require roughly 20 minutes, except for pasta.
To avoid a starchy mess, pasta should be cooked separately and then added.
To gauge cooking times for various ingredients, drop them from a height of a couple of feet. If it goes “thud” — carrots, potatoes, turnips — it needs to go in about 10 minutes before the things that go “thwap” — broccoli, cabbage, mushrooms, meat. Dried beans make more of a “dink,” so they require an entire hour. Leftover veggies require very little time but should be rinsed well before being added in order to rinse off any prior seasoning.
For each serving, use a cup of stock, no more than a quarter-cup of filler and a quarter-cup of bric-a-brac. A little lemon juice, vinegar or soy sauce adds kick. A couple of eggs or a little half-and-half adds creaminess. Use fresh herbs if at all possible, and season simply. Garnish with parley or green onions, and serve with croutons, crackers or good, rustic bread.