Creamy Turkey Soup with Wild Rice & Mushrooms

Okay, it's turkey time, or just about! I always think the best thing about turkey is the leftovers, and I know I am not alone in that. Here are some pretty deeelightful and soignée leftovers. Wild rice! Mushrooms! Cream! Hot dawg!

I mean, no hot dogs. C'mon; you know what I mean. Anyway, here is a lovely, easy (supposing you have cooked a turkey), and really quite substantial soup. Maybe some Stuffing Bread is all you need to make it a meal.

6 to 8 servings
1 hour assorted futzing to prepare rice and stock
1 hour to finish the soup

Advance Preparation - Cook the Wild Rice:
1/2 cup wild rice
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 cups water
prepare 6 cups turkey stock, and 1 to 2 cups cooked turkey

As ever, it's easiest to cook that wild rice in the rice cooker: put in rice, salt, and water and turn it on. Take it out once the machine turns off. Or, do it the hard way: put said ingredients in an appropriate pot and bring to a boil on the stove. As soon as it boils, turn it down to very low and cook until the water is absorbed, about 45 minutes.

This soup presupposes you have the remains of a cooked turkey, and have covered the carcass thereof with water, and added bay leaves and veggie scraps, and simmered until there was stock. Likewise, a reasonable amount of cooked turkey was set aside for this purpose. Failing that you had better buy a turkey thigh and put it in water and simmer as above, until you have stock and cooked turkey. Strain the stock, being careful that it's the bones, etc, that are disposed of, and dice your cooked turkey into soup-sized pieces. Keep them separately in the fridge until needed.

All of this should certainly be done the day before. 

Finish the Soup:
1 or 2 stalks of celery (1 cup finely diced celeriac)
1 large leek
200 grams (1/2 pound) mushrooms
3 or 4 cloves of garlic
2 tablespoons turkey or bacon fat
3 tablespoons flour
salt & freshly ground black pepper to taste
1 teaspoon rubbed thyme or savory
2/3 cup sour cream

Put your pot of stock on to come up to a simmer again.

Wash, trim, and chop the celery. Wash, trim, and chop the leek. Clean, trim and slice the mushrooms.

Heat the fat in a large skillet, over medium-high heat. Cook the celery and leeks in it until softened; about 5 minutes, with some stirring. Add the mushrooms and cook them down until reduced and softened, then add the garlic. Stir in well then sprinkle the flour and seasonings over the vegetables.

Mix that in and continue cooking until there are no signs of raw flour. Ladle in a bit of broth and mix it in to deglaze the pan (remove anything inclined to stick to it). Swish it all back into the pot of soup. Add the wild rice and the chopped turkey.

Simmer for another 10 minutes or so until the soup is slightly thickened. Add the sour cream and bring the soup back  up to steaming hot but do not let it simmer or it will curdle. Serve at once.




Last year at this time I made Rolled Spice Cookies.

Posted in: Ontario Food