The WILD side of soup!

A few years ago I went to a luncheon and one of my friends brought the most yummy WILD RICE SOUP. I loved it so much I just had to get the recipe from her.

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Today I am going to put an end to some myths
that I have had about Wild Rice.
First off, I used to think the following 2 things:
---Anything cooked with Wild Rice was expensive to make
---Anything cooked with Wild Rice was fattening to eat
because it always involved cream or half and half

Regarding the cost of Wild Rice...even though Wild Rice is expensive at around $5.00 per pound (at least that's the price it was when I purchased it in November) it is really light and so 1 cup doesn't weigh too much and if you cook up 1 cup of Wild Rice it only costs about $1.25 and you get 4 cups of cooked rice.

Regarding calories....I made up this yummy soup and substituted milk for the half and half and only used 1/2 the amount of butter it called for and you couldn't tell a difference. I also rarely have fresh mushrooms in my home and so I made the recipe with chicken instead and it was just as delicious.

I am kind of a "health conscious" cook, in the fact that I like to make our main dish meals as "low-fat", "low sugar" and nutritious as I can because
I would rather save my calories
for DESSERT or some yummy treat!

Just a little info about me...
at our home everyone always dishes up their plates for dinner and as soon as I have dished up my plate I fill containers with leftovers for us to eat for lunch the next day.

Well, yesterday I made up my Wild Rice Soup and it was such a success that my kids wanted to eat their lunch leftovers for SECONDS. They just loved it and wanted us to make some more so they could enjoy this for lunch as well. Jade even snuck another bowl while we were enjoying a movie.

So, I got to be side by side with my sweetie working in the kitchen as we made up another batch of soup because he wanted to have all of the details about how I made it. He thought it was going to be so hard and time consuming and was amazed when he found out how EASY it was.
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TIDBIT.....
You can buy Wild Rice at "Winco" or "Fred Meyer" in the BULK food section. It stores well (just like white or brown rice)and is a fun variation if you are living off your food storage to make this soup every few months as a change of pace.
First, the night before
I turned on my oven to 500 degrees and when it was heated up
I put 1 cup of Wild Rice in a

pan and poured 4 cups of BOILING water over it,
put a lid on the pan and
turned the oven off and let it cook overnight.

The next morning I pulled the pan out of the oven
and here is what the rice looks like
after it is cooked.
$1.25 made up 4 cups of Rice enough to make 2 batches of soup.
I always freeze the extra rice in SNACK size bags
(which hold 1 cup each) so I can have some for future soups.

I usually have bags of chicken/broth stock in my freezer,
however, I can't say the same about BEEF Stock and so I just wanted to share that Tones Brand works wonderfully well for making soups and it doesn't have MSG.
(BTW...this is paste and not a powder
and I get it at Sam's Club).

Chicken and Wild Rice Soup
2 Tbsp. Butter
1 Large OR 3 small onions finely chopped
4 celery stalks finely chopped
4 carrots finely chopped
1/2 to 1 tsp dried parsley
8 cups water mixed with 4 tsp. of TONES Beef Base
2 chicken breasts cooked and cut into small pieces
1/2 cup flour
2 cups milk
salt and pepper to taste
2 cups cooked Wild Rice

Melt butter in large pan over medium heat and
add in onions, carrots, celery and parsley and
cook for 10-15 minutes stirring often until onions are translucent and veggies are tender.
Add in the chicken and cook 5-10 more minutes.
Add the flour to this and mix well.
Cook until flour is golden color (usually 2-3 minutes).
Slowly add the Beef Stock and milk and blend well.
Continue cooking until it thickens.
Stir in cooked Wild Rice and simmer for another 15-20 minutes (or longer----I let mine simmer about an hour and it was yummy too).

VERY delicious!!

(For a vegetarian alternative you can leave out the chicken and add in 3 cups fresh chopped mushrooms instead).

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Just how Frugal with this meal?
Wild Rice---.63
Chicken---$1.50
Celery, carrots and onions---.75
Milk ---.30
Bouillion, flour and butter---.40
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Total--$3.58
4 people had 2 dinners and 3 people had 1 lunch for this price!

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ADDENDUM....when I bought the Wild Rice I used in this recipe it was $5.03 per pound in November....HOWEVER, I just went shopping this weekend and Wild Rice is now up to $8.03 per pound and so I purchased 1/2 pound of Rice and got 1-3/4 cup rice for this price and so the price will vary from what I was able to make this soup up for. HOWEVER, it is a FUN treat to make up for a change of pace from the ordinary things you make and it is still economical!