Someone had the brilliant idea about 100 years ago to collect the most dramatic, sappy, soapy, insane, unbelievable, puke-worthy, tear-jerking stories of all time.
They started publishing them in a series of books titled:
Chicken Soup for the Soul
If you have never seen one of these books before there could only be two reasons.
- You are literally blind and need to get glasses ASAP as possible.
- You were born in a small cave and kept there by someone you assumed was your mother but turned out to be an evil old woman who captured you and decided to raise you as her own. You were never allowed to leave the cave and the only activity you participated in was crushing small red berries and leaving paintings of all kinds across the walls. You lived there for years believing that life only consisted of rounded walls and dirty floors… until one day when you decided to leave the cave and you realized that the world was a much bigger place than you ever imagined and discovering the chicken soup for the soul books became your last priority on the list of things to learn about.
Chicken Soup for the Soul books are EVERYWHERE.
I see at least one a week.
Once you start noticing them.
You. Will. Never. Stop.
I was introduced to this genre of books by my plant-growing, chicken-feeding, stew-brewing grandmother who lived in a giant trailer in Kooskia Idaho next to a giant mountain.
She sent us packages constantly of creepy little dolls she made out of banana peels, newspaper clippings of grandmothers who sued their sons for not visiting them, and Chicken Soup For The Soul Books.
I was, am, and will always be a big reader… so one day I decided to give one a try… and I
Could. Not. Put. It. Down.
I read about a little boy in India who had to hold onto the side of a train through the chilly night before giving up and letting the train crush his body to death.
I read about a young woman who was diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer that slowly overtook her entire body until her final gasp of breath.
I read about a family dog who rescued people from fires, drowning and suicide only to be shot 27 times by a drug-addicted teen leaving the family heartbroken.
I read about a woman who married 4 separate times only for them to die one by one by unknown causes.
I honestly did not know what to do with the stories I had just consumed
Some of them definitely seemed fake
Others seemed WAAAAAAAAY overdramatized
And most of them were just plain heartbreaking
Ever since that moment, I have seen a Chicken Soup For The Soul book at least once a week.
Here are some that I’ve seen.
Chicken Soup for the Teen’s Soul
Chicken Soup for the Teen’s Soul 2
Chicken Soup for the Romantic Soul
Chicken Soup for the Golfer’s Soul (I GUARANTEE you that this book has a story in it about someone getting hit in the face with a golf ball David and Goliath style only to die on the hospital bed with their fiance crying next to them on the day before their wedding)
Chicken Soup for the Jewish Soul
Chicken Soup for the Patriot’s Soul
Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul
A Second Helping of Chicken Soup for the Soul
Chicken Soup for the Soul at Work
Chicken Soup for the Soul: My Resolution From This Day Forward
Chicken Soup for the Soul: Teens Talk Getting To College
And. SOOOOO. Much. More.
I suppose at some point people used to purchase these books… but now most of them are at the thrift store. Go to any Savers, Goodwill, or Salvation Army and you WILL find one.
This could be for a few reasons.
- The people who bought them probably never read them and got rid of them.
- The book was gifted to them and they never cracked a page so they got rid of it.
- Someone actually did read it and decided to purposely remove it from their lives because each book is traumatic in its own way.
I started feeling bad about how much paper was wasted in publishing these books that nobody is reading… and an idea presented itself to me
IDEA: Chicken Soup For the Soul Club.
I gather a group of people, buy them each a personalized copy of Chicken Soup for the Soul that was written for their specific likes and interests… and we discuss stories while we sit around eating chicken soup.
The club totally works.
I spent a couple of weeks collecting a variety of Chicken Soup books for my cousins who I knew I was going to force to participate in this club.
One day for lunch we all gathered with our bowls of soup and laughed, cringed, said the words “bless their hearts” too often, and maybe possibly decided to be better people.
It’s the perfect club
This first club meeting resulted in me hearing one of the most outrageous, unbelievable, and insane stories I’ve ever come across in all my chicken soup reading days.
It was a story of a Ronald McDonald actor who loved kids but couldn’t touch or hold them because of company policy and how he decided to forgo this policy to hold this kid dying of cancer…
It was WILD… and also way too funny
So visit your nearest Savers, Goodwill, or other Thrift Store, buy a pile of Chicken Soup for the Soul books, invite some friends (or just random people from the street) make some soup and bread and have yourself a Chicken Soup Club.
Ari’s Super Specific Chicken Soup Recipe
- 1 Rotisserie Chicken from Costco
- Some Celery
- Some Carrots
- 2 Onions
- A bunch of garlic cloves
- Bay Leaves
- Noodles
- A bunch of random dried herbs
- An instant pot
Separate all the chicken from the bones of the chicken carcass.
Place the remaining chicken carcass aggressively into your instant pot.
Add some carrots, celery, onion, peppercorns, bay leaves, garlic cloves, and a bunch of random herbs like basil, oregano, and parsley. Also add cayenne, salt, and pepper.
It’s literally impossible to mess up bone broth so the measurements don’t really matter at all.
Cover everything with water and set your instant pot to High Pressure for 120 minutes on the manual setting.
Once your broth is cooked, drain out everything except the broth.
I repeat. DO NOT DRAIN THE BROTH DOWN THE SINK.
Put the broth to the side.
Cut an onion, carrots, celery, garlic and add it to a pot with some olive oil.
Cook these things until they are kind of soft.
Add your chicken broth, noodles, and chicken to the pot.
Cook everything until the noodles are done.
Add a bunch of random herbs and spices until it tastes how you want it to.
Now serve it up into bowls and have the best Chicken Soup Club of your life.
But seriously no warning will be sufficient to prepare you for the stories inside these books.
Proceed with caution.