Creamy Chicken Soup

This recipe is something Mom and I made up together. We had bread bowls from Panera Bread and wanted a creamy soup to go in them. We both started grabbing ingredients and throwing them in and when we were done.. wow. Quite possibly the BEST chicken soup ever. Seriously. It makes a lot, but that's ok because you won't be able to stop eating it. The stick of butter and heavy cream probably have something to do with that.. 

Creamy Chicken Soup

From: Judy & Christi

1 Whole chicken

1 onion

16 oz. baby carrots

16 oz. sliced mushrooms

32 oz. carton of heavy cream

5-6 medium potatoes

1 stick butter

parsley flakes

salt & pepper

Place whole chicken in a large stock pot, add hot water to cover the

chicken. Add salt, pepper, and parsley flakes to water and bring to a

boil, then let simmer on low for 1 1/2 hours.

Wash potatoes and cut into chunks, leaving skin on. (you can make

smaller chunks or peel potatoes if you like- I like skin on and I

chunk them in kinda large pieces).

Chop baby carrots in half (or smaller if you want..)

Chop onion

Take chicken out of pot and remove all bones,  pull apart into bite

size chunks.

Put chicken, onion, carrots, mushrooms, potatoes, and butter back into

chicken broth. Add salt and pepper to taste if needed and bring to a

boil, then let simmer on low for 1 hour.

add heavy cream and let simmer for at least 15 minutes.

If needed, you can add a can of chicken broth during the process if

the liquids run low.

Serve in sourdough bread bowl. Yumm. (If you are like me and cannot make a bread bowl to save your life... Panera Bread has the BEST bread bowls and they are cheap.. or any local bakery /bakery section of your grocery store..) 


*Note* Made this for dinner tonight, and left out the butter. I could tell no difference in the taste- so I will probably omit it from now on. No sense in adding it if it doesn't change the taste that much. The broth from boiling the chicken and the cream is rich enough that the butter isn't really needed. :-) Also, we didn't make it to Cape to get Panera Bread Bowls this time and I had some leftover french bread from pasta last night- it was a perfect substitute. So if you can't or don't want Panera Bread- Sourdough French Bread from Wal-Mart bakery is almost exactly the same. Yum!