Chicken and Wild Rice Soup

This recipe is from Lyn Schafer at Classic Floral Design in Waukee.  She was gracious enough to make 18 gallons of this soup to share with the community to help celebrate our annual Winterfest celebration.  It was so good, I needed to make some for myself.  The recipe has lots of different steps so it did take me a while to get it put together the first time but I always allow double time to make something on my first try.  I added some helpful tips at the bottom in hopes that your first attempt won't be as disorganized as mine.  Thanks for the soup, Lyn!

Chicken and Wild Rice Soup

1 box Uncle Ben's wild rice mix
8 oz. cream cheese cubed
1 can evaporated milk
2 to 4 chicken breasts, cooked and cubed or shredded
2- 15 oz. cans chicken broth
1 cup chopped carrots (into bite-sized pieces)
1/4 onion - chopped

Make rice per box instructions. While rice is cooking, chop onions and carrots.  Saute onion in small amount of oil until tender.  Add carrots to onion and saute for about 5 minutes, stirring every few minutes so they don't burn. Boil, bake or grill chicken (however you choose to cook the chicken).  Combine all ingredients into crockpot or large pot.  As mixture thickens, you may need to add some milk to thin it out.

Helpful Tips:
This recipe will require 4 different cooking pots/pans.  I doubled the recipe and used a 2 quart saucepan for the rice, 12 inch skillet for onions and carrots, 5 quart stockpot for boiling chicken (you could also use leftover grilled or baked chicken) and a large oval crockpot for the soup.  With the doubled recipe, the soup barely fit in the crockpot.  If you make a single batch, it will fit in a 5 quart stockpot on the stove. 

If you are using a crockpot, you can put the broth and cream cheese in first to start melting the cream cheese.  You will need to stir and smash the cream cheese against the side to get it all mixed in so it may be easier to get it started melting before adding other ingredients.

Alternate way to do the chicken and broth:  You can get bone-in chicken and add 8 cups water when boiling and then use the broth you've made for your chicken broth.  This will not work for boneless skinless chicken because you won't get the flavor you need. 

I am not a big fan of onions but this was fine. I probably could have used more onion and I still would have liked it.

A double batch makes a huge amount of soup so I hope it freezes OK.  I'll update on how well it comes out of the freezer.





If you try it, let me know how you like it.