Chicken & Wild Rice Soup
I love using and re-using ingredients to create delicious meals. I’m also a big believer in using up left overs and wasting as little as I can in our household because… well six people to feed and groceries can get expensive. Am I right?!
Over the summer at one of the farmer’s markets in the area I ordered grain-fed, organic chickens. I asked forte larger ones… and boy oh boy did that farmer deliver. I got the call to come and pick them up as they were ready and I came home with about 40 pounds of chicken! Ha ha! I asked for the larger ones (between 5 and 8 kg) so I ended up with four 10+ pound birds. That’s like the size of a medium sized turkey just to put that into perspective… So what did I do?
Well, I froze three because we don’t need that much chicken happening all at one time, but I did invite my parents over for a traditional Sunday Night Supper. We had one of the 10lb chickens (we roasted it), with mashed potatoes, steamed carrots, roasted acorn squash, and a baguette… PLUS GRAVY (you can’t forget about the gravy)! Four adults + four children, and I made lunches age next day for the older two using leftovers, and we still only conquered about 1/2 of the bird. So I stripped all the meat and got to work making chicken stock. As it was simmering away, I knew I didn’t want it to just hit the freezer and I NEEDED to use it somehow this week, and within 20 minutes of it being done, cooled, and skimmed, I was right back in front of the stove making this soup.
If you follow me on instagram, you will have already seen what I created, and I didn’t want to wait too long to share this epic soup, so here we are, a few days later, and all of my soup gone!
This soup has a combo of wild rice & brown rice from a blend I bought at the grocery store, and I love how it turned out. Between the rice, mushrooms, and chicken, this is a complete meal in a bowl. Clint topped his with a little sriracha for a hit of heat, and asked for seconds. So all in all I call this 20 minute soup success!
You don’t need to make your own stock for this, but I chose to because well… what else do you do with the chicken remains after roasting them?
Chicken & Wild Rice Soup
Ingredients
- 6 cups Chicken Broth
- 1 tbsp Olive Oil
- 1 medium White Onion chopped
- 2 cloves Garlic minced
- 4 medium Carrots chopped
- 4 stalks Celery chopped
- 2 cup Long Grain Wild Rice uncooked
- 1 1/2 cups Cooked Chicken cubed or shredded
- 1 cup Cremini Mushrooms sliced
- 4 sprigs Thyme
- 1 Bay leaf
- salt & pepper to taste
Instructions
- In a large stock pot over medium heat add olive oil and onions. Cook onions until translucent (don’t brown them).Add carrots, celery, and garlic. Continue to cook until garlic is fragrant. Add in mushrooms and rice. Stir everything and cook about 3 mins until the rice looks a little wet from the sautéed vegetables.
- Add chicken broth and bring to boil. Reduce heat to a low simmer. Add bay leaf & thyme sprigs, put a lid on, and simmer until rice is cooked (about 20 minutes).
- Stir in chicken, remove bay leaves and thyme stems. Season with salt & pepper, and continue a low simmer until chicken is warmed.Serve warm with your favourite crusty bread and butter! Enjoy!
This is by far one of my favourite soups to make in the fall. It’s like all the flavours came together so easily, and it really is a complete meal! We enjoyed it for dinner, and it served up perfectly in thermoses for the girls the next day as a warm lunch at school. I love when I can turn a huge dinner into multiple meals!
This would easily work after Thanksgiving, Christmas, or any time you make a turkey. The combo of dark and white meat also add another great layer of flavour, so don’t be shy to shred up any thighs or legs left over from any rotisserie bird you may have left over.
Have you made your own stock before? Do you make soup with your leftovers? What is your favourite
“left over” dish to make?
