Italian wedding soup with chicken meatballs and homemade stock

Separate leg from thigh; cut out the thigh bone and pull off the skin; lop off what meat comes easily from the legs. Keep ropy tendons out if possible. Bone and skin to the stockpot, meat to a bowl.

Add an onion, a few carrots and a couple stalks of celery to the bones and skin. Brown under the broiler, stirring and returning for a few minutes, or fry on the stovetop until browned.

Cover everything with filtered water, put the lid on and cook in the oven at 200F / 95C overnight, up to 24 hours; or at twice those numbers for a couple of hours.

Fish out and discard the solids. Skimming the fat is optional.

Optional clarifying: beat a couple of egg whites with some cold water, stir into the warm stock and bring back to a simmer on the stove. After about 10 minutes kill the heat and skim off the raft with a slotted spoon, or pass through a sieve.

Pulse the meat in a food processor in two batches until almost a paste but still a little chunky.

Add the egg yolks, breadcrumbs (about a quarter of the mix by dry volume), a lot of pepper, red pepper flakes, garlic powder, dried thyme, oregano, sage and salt; mix.

Microwave a little of the mix and taste for seasoning. Mix in more fat, olive oil or the skimmed chicken fat, since chicken is lean.

Roll into meatballs.

Cut an onion into frenched slices or wedges and the carrots into quarters.

To the simmering broth add about half a bottle of white wine, bay leaves, the cheese rind, a couple pinches of salt, the onion and carrots.

Either drop the meatballs straight into the broth to poach, or first brown them in a non-stick pan without cooking them through, then add to the broth.

Add a little pasta, not too much as it expands. Simmer until the vegetables are soft and the meatballs cooked through, about half an hour.

Cut the tough centre stem out of the kale; add the greens about 10 minutes before eating.

Fish out the bay leaves. Stir in peeled, chopped fresh garlic right before eating. Taste and add salt; if no wine was used, add lemon juice or vinegar to taste.