Creamy Chicken and Wild Rice Soup

I'm not a huge fan of soup, as a rule. Actually, I'm just not a huge fan of soup as the main course of a meal. It never really seems to fill me up. This one was an exception.  Serve it with homemade dinner rolls and it's meal.

Creamy Chicken and Wild Rice Soup

Here's the original recipe (from Allrecipes.com):

Ingredients

• 4 cups chicken broth
• 2 cups water
• 2 cooked, boneless chicken breast halves, shredded
• 1 (4.5 ounce) package quick cooking long grain and wild rice with seasoning packet
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup butter
• 2 cups heavy cream

Directions

1. In a large pot over medium heat, combine broth, water and chicken. Bring just to boiling, then stir in rice, reserving seasoning packet. Cover and remove from heat.
2. In a small bowl, combine salt, pepper and flour. In a medium saucepan over medium heat, melt butter. Stir in contents of seasoning packet until mixture is bubbly. Reduce heat to low, then stir in flour mixture by tablespoons, to form a roux. Whisk in cream, a little at a time, until fully incorporated and smooth. Cook until thickened, 5 minutes.
3. Stir cream mixture into broth and rice. Cook over medium heat until heated through, 10 to 15 minutes.

Printable Recipe

I changed it a little, because I didn't have everything on hand.  I used whole milk, instead of cream.  Next time I may even use skim, because I don't think it would change the finished product the way it is used.

I also added large chunks of carrots, because I LOVE cooked carrots.  They added a nice change in texture and a sweet counter to the savory flavor of the soup.  I would have liked to add celery, but alas the only celery I had was molded and smooshy in the bottom of my vegetable bin.  (I've since cleaned and replaced the bin :-)

I didn't have Wild Rice with Seasoning Packet so I just used 1/2 c. wild rice (4.5 oz. is 1/2 plus 1/16th cup), and to taste (probably a quarter tsp. each) garlic, onion powder, fresh ground pepper, and poultry seasoning.  I let it boil a little longer than called for, because it wasn't a quick-cook rice.  Next time I'll cook the rice separately and add it in for the last five minutes.  I may add more rice too, I like wild rice's a lot!

One more thing to do differently, I would omit the salt.  Because I used chicken soup base with water, instead of chicken broth.  It was a little bit too salty.

I give it four stars, because I really liked it.  The fifth star will come with my changes next time.  It was really filling and stored well.  I'll be finishing it for lunch today.  Totally restaurant quality soup.

Do you have a favorite soup?  

Do you serve soup as a side or main dish?

Thursday is our scheduled Soup day, so this will be going on my Thursday menu.