This is a printer-friendly version of an article from Zip06.com.

In the Soup

There are all kinds of rules about what to eat and what to avoid: be wary of trans fats, and cholesterol-laden foods; don’t load up with too many carbohydrates; don’t forget to eat enough fruits and vegetables. And remember, regardless of what the Department of Agriculture once said some 40 years ago, ketchup is not a vegetable.

I know the Weight Watchers guidelines; the Paleo diet and going back some years, the Atkins diet. I know all those rules. I have broken them all. But, on a chilly afternoon when I stopped at one of my favorite local lunch spots, I realized there is a rule that I will never have to break: the chicken soup rule.

It is pretty simple: if you stick to the chicken soup rule, you can get through the day, any day, no matter how challenging.

Is chicken soup liquid love? Is it therapy for which you don’t have to submit a medical claim form? Is it just a borscht-belt comedian's reliable laugh line (and why are they eating borscht not chicken soup)?

Everybody knows the chicken soup legends, the generational wisdom passed on from grandmother central that whatever ails you, chicken soup will make it better.

Okay, I thought, maybe not a sprained ankle but an article I found from Web MD citing a dietician from Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital in Boston said that chicken is high in tryptophan, helping the body make serotonin, a neurotransmitter that can improve mood.

So at least your spirits would be a bit better even if the ankle still hurts.

The steam from the soup unclogs noses, the carrots and celery swimming in the broth give you the vegetables, and then there are the noodles, a source of carbohydrates, which are a quick source of needed energy. Yes, yes, they say don’t overindulge carbs, but on the other hand, no energy is no fun.

Still, the noodle-carb issue remains a difficult one for me. It is probably the reason my regrettable overeat gene often signals me that the soup, wonderful as it was, could have had just a few more noodles.

There are other soups that I like; clam chowder, New England of course; onion soup with a cheese crust; and Italian wedding soup where I admit my chief pleasure is fishing the small meatballs out of the broth.

But chicken soup remains in a class by itself. When there is none on the store shelf in the deli where I buy their homemade version, I have come away with a quart of turkey noodle soup. It should, if not the same, at least be the same enough. But the aroma is different; there are no golden globules of dissolved chicken fat to add richness to the broth.

Maybe I am being overly picky, but the inexplicable wonder of chickenness is missing.

No insult to the turkey but it is a bird of a different kind, zoologically as well as gastronomically. And, after all, turkey has its own moment of glory, the most American of holidays, Thanksgiving.

Everybody has their own set of guidelines for living. Everybody’s guidelines are different. Nobody wants to be told how to run their own life. Still, with all that in mind, let me venture a small suggestion for happiness: if chicken soup is on the menu, order it.