Wild Rice Soup

Growing up in Minnesota, wild rice soup was one of my favorite cold day, warm up, feel good dishes. As I’ve moved further and further south, I still love when the weather is cold, and this dish calls my name.

This dish is also perfect for using up some of those Thanksgiving leftover ingredients! I usually replace the chicken with leftover turkey, I use mushrooms, onion, and chicken broth leftover from making the stuffing. I often replace the sherry with some red wine from dinner the night before. When I was growing up we would occasionally have wild rice as a side dish which could be added directly to this recipe, and I would have leftover half and half usually from a dessert or green bean casserole! — So it has now become tradition at my house that the day after Thanksgiving is a day for wild rice soup. A perfect way to use up leftover turkey without getting sick of turkey sandwiches. Though I did make a batch of brioche, with half of the dough baked as sandwich buns, and half of it baked as rolls for Thanksgiving dinner.

Equipment I use:

Enamel Dutch Oven

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Wild Rice Soup

Creamy wild rice soup with chicken and mushrooms – also perfectly modified for using up leftover Thanksgiving turkey!

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Prep Time 45 minutes mins

Cook Time 1 hour hr 15 minutes mins

Course Soup

Cuisine American

Servings 10 servings

Equipment

• Soup pot

Ingredients

  

• ½ cup butter
• 1 yellow onion diced
• ½ cup celery diced
• ½ cup carrot diced
• 1 lb button mushrooms sliced
• ¾ cup flour
• 6 cup chicken broth
• 2 cup wild rice cooked
• 1 lb cooked chicken diced
• 2 tsp salt
• ½ tsp pepper
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp mustard powder
• ½ tsp dried parsley
• 1 cup slivered almonds optional
• 3 Tbsp dry sherry
• 2 c half and half

Instructions

 

• Prepare your precooked ingredients – cook and chicken and bowl wild rice if not already done. Note that wild rice takes significantly longer to cook than white rice (as it's not actually rice at all). Cook per package instructions.
• In a large soup pot melt butter. Add diced onion, celery, and carrot. Cook for 5 minutes, until just beginning to soften and turn transparent.
• Add sliced mushrooms, cook for 2 more minutes.
• Add flour and stir well, evenly coating your vegetables.
• Stir in your chicken broth. Bring just to a boil before reducing to a simmer.
• Add your cooked wild rice, chicken, salt, pepper, cumin, mustard powder, parsley, almonds (if using), and sherry. Allow the mixture to heat through (2-3 minutes)
• Make sure that your soup is at no more than a simmer and stir in the half and half.
• Let simmer 1-2 hours, take care not to boil or the soup will separate. Stir periodically so that ingredients do not stick to the bottom of the pot.

Notes

• I’ve learned since leaving Minnesota, that wild rice is not always available (or affordable). Blends which include wild rice (such as Lundberg Wild Blend) are excellent replacements – just try to find blends that also don’t include additional seasonings (e.g. Uncle Ben’s)
• This recipe makes a very large batch – Depending on the amount of leftovers from Thanksgiving I often make a half batch. Leftovers freeze very well.

Keyword chicken, mushrooms, soup, thanksgiving, wild rice