Most recipes usually serve four people at the minimum and often are meant for eight. So that means if you are cooking for two, be prepared for a lot of leftovers.

That’s the case with preparing an entire chicken. Whether the bird is cut up for frying or left whole for roasting, if you’re only serving two, there is going to be a pile of chicken left on the platter.

I recently roasted a chicken that weighed about 5½ pounds. Along with some carrots and potatoes that were cooked with the chicken in a Wagner Ware Magnalite roaster that was my Mom’s, it made for a mighty fine meal. But talk about leftovers…

Here’s a tasty, vegetable-laden soup recipe that makes use of some of those leftovers. The recipe calls for only 2 cups of shredded chicken, which still leaves a lot for another meal, perhaps chow mein, but the leftover carrots and potatoes found a home in the soup.

And the nice thing about this soup recipe, which serves about four, is that the leftovers (about 1 quart) just need to be heated up to be enjoyed.

Chicken Vegetable Soup
2 cups cooked chicken, shredded
2 potatoes, cut into bite-size pieces
2 carrots, sliced 1-inch thick
1 onion, diced
1 stalk celery, diced
1 cup frozen peas
8 cups vegetable stock
2 tablespoons salt
1 tablespoon pepper
2 tablespoons herbes de Provence
¼ cup medium pearled barley
Place all ingredients in stock pot and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 2 hours.
Yield: Serves 4.