Chicken Rice Soup ~5 ingredients~ Kid Approved

I wanted to share this yummy, easy, kid-approved chicken and rice soup that my mother in law shared with me.  Within the last week, I have made it two times but with different flavors of rice.  The variations are different but delicious.
What makes it even better is that you can make it the fast way with store bought rotisserie chicken and canned broth, or you can do a bit more work and cook up a chicken and make some stock.  The latter will take a bit more prep, but the flavor is delicious.  Either way this recipe is kid tested and approved.

My apologies for the picture quality.  I snapped a few on my phone, but this was a weeknight meal that was devoured soon after making.

Please see variations at the bottom.

Chicken and Rice Soup

I 2lb. rotisserie chicken

1 yellow onion

4 TBsp. butter

1 pkg boxed rice, Spanish or Chicken

4 cans or 8 cups chicken broth
Vegetable add ins, like spinach, peas, carrots, beans, whatever you want to add

Remove chicken from bone and dice.

Saute chopped onion in 2 Tbsp. butter in soup pot.

Remove onion.  Saute rice with remaining 2 Tbsp butter.  Prepare rice in soup pot until al dente.  I shave a couple minutes off cooking time. 

Add chicken and sauteed onion to rice.

Add four cans chicken broth or 8 cups of homemade broth. 

Once you have this base of onion, rice and chicken in the broth you can add other things if you wish.  I sometimes add corn, or carrots, or a mixture.  Let soup heat thoroughly or just to a boil.  Always add the spinach just before serving.  This recipe makes 8 cups.

Variations
Use a whole roasting chicken (5lbs) and cook in the simple crock pot method from 100 days of Real Food. This really is the easiest and tastiest method to cook chicken.  It is my go to recipe now because I start it in the morning when the little one is napping and by dinner we have chicken.  I use a 5 lbs. bird so we can have dinner and plenty left for the soup or salad or enchiladas.  After the chicken is cooked.  I remove the meat and leave everything else (bones and onion) in the crock pot.  Now its time to make Crock Pot Stock.  I add some celery, carrots, a bit more onion, and sometimes potato peels.  Cover with cold water and turn on low overnight.  In the morning, I strain the stock and refrigerate until that evening when I am assembling the soup.  For more information on crock pot stock, please see this great post by Maureen at Coconut Love.  She has a lot of great information about stock.  This is also where I learned that you can make homemade stock pretty effortlessly in the crock pot.

The next thing you can do to change up this soup's flavor is change the type of boxed rice mix you use.  I have used Spanish rice which made a lovely soup reminiscent of chicken tortilla soup but without the tortilla.  We topped with cheese and avocado.  Yum!  I also made it with vegetable and chicken rice and it was more like traditional chicken and rice soup.  The kids loved it!

The last thing that can really change and enhance the flavor and nutrition is the vegetable add ins.  I love dark leafy greens in broth based soup.  Stir in spinich, kale, swiss chard, or beet greens in at the end to just wilt.  For my kids, I add the peas, carrots, corn, and green bean mixture I found in the frozen section.  It is something I always have on hand.

We have rain in the forecast for the next couple days.  Yay, we need it!  Perfect weather to try this soup again but with curry flavored rice.  I would love to hear about your variations.