Chicken Soup

Clean the rooster and take care to remove all blood. Put in a large stock pot along with all the good parts, neck, giblets, etc., and the cleaned, peeled feet. Add the cool water. Bring to a boil, carefully skimming off the scum as it rises to the surface. There should be no more scum when the boil breaks. Whack the spice bundle a couple of times with the flat side of a meat cleaver to bruise everything and drop it into the pot. Add the second group of vegetables and herbs, but *do not* add either saffron or salt (salt will only toughen the chicken at this stage). Simmer 2-3 hours, until the chicken is tender. Turn off the heat and stir in the saffron and parsley. Taste and season. Remove the chicken to a large plate and when it is cool enough to handle, pick the meat off the bones; discard the bones and strain the juices back into the soup. Refrigerate the meat. Top a large bowl with a fine-mesh sieve and line the sieve with 3-4 thicknesses of cheesecloth dipped in very cold water and wrung out. Strain the contents of the soup pot through the cheesecloth. Press hard on the solids with the back of a wooden spoon to get all the flavor into the broth. If necessary, strain a second time through fresh cheesecloth. Discard the cheesecloth and all the vegetables (they have already given u all their richness into the broth and have nothing left). Refrigerate the bowl of broth overnight. Next day, the fat will have risen to the surface and hardened; it can easily be removed and discarded. Freeze some of the broth into suitable portions for future use. For soup today, cook some noodles, diced carrot and parsnip, sliced celery, chopped onion and any other vegetables that you like and add some of the chopped chicken meat. Use other chopped chicken to make chicken salad.