Fall

Lemony Roasted Chicken Soup with Rosemary Croutons

by:
September 23, 2013
5
2 Ratings
Lemony Roasted Chicken Soup with Rosemary Croutons
Photo by La452
  • Serves 4
Author Notes

My favorite way to roast chicken is with lemon and rosemary - I make one pretty much weekly once the weather cools off a bit. The carcass always goes to stock, so I sort of naturally followed the mental path to a roasted chicken soup with "cheater" stock, and then some nice croutons to finish. This is a bit of an afternoon project, which I happen to love on a cool day, but it's fun to spend the day with your soup I think. Perfect for an Autumn evening repast! —aargersi

What You'll Need
Ingredients
  • Roasted Chicken Soup
  • 2 large bone-in skin-on chicken breasts
  • 4 carrots
  • 4 ribs celery
  • 1 medium yellow onion
  • 2 lemons
  • 6 cups low salt chicken broth
  • 1 cup cooked barley, brown rice or farro (I actually used a combo of the three)
  • 1 pinch crushed red pepper
  • olive oil
  • salt and pepper
  • Toasted Rosemary Croutons
  • 1 tablespoon finely minced fresh rosemary
  • zest of one lemon
  • 2 tablespoons shredded parmesan
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 8 slices baguette or French bread
Directions
  1. Roasted Chicken Soup
  2. Heat the oven to 350. Scrub 2 carrots, 2 celerys, and quarter the onion. Place them on a baking sheet. Put the two chicken breasts on there, and then rub the veggies and the chicken all over with olive oil - make sure the chicken is skin side up on the sheet.. Wash your hands. Squeeze the juice from 1 lemon on the chicken. Sprinkle the veggies and chicken with salt and pepper and into the oven. After 30 minutes remove the veggies and let the chicken cook for another 20-30 minutes until the skin is golden and crisp. Allow it to cool. Snitch some skin (you would anyways so might as well make it official). Remove the chicken meat from the bones, and set them and the uneaten skin aside.
  3. Now put the stock, roasted veggies, chicken bones and skin into a soup pot. Bring to a simmer and let it go for 30 minutes. Meanwhile peel and dice the other two carrots and dice the other celery. Dry toast the grain in a non stick skillet for several minutes.
  4. NOW - strain your stock and return it to a soup pot. Add the diced carrots and celery, the grain, and pinch of red pepper. Shred or chop up the chicken and add that, and squeeze in the juice of the second lemon. Taste for salt, simmer for about 10 minutes and taste for salt and heat again. Adjust for both and simmer until the vegetables are tender. Serve with croutons!
  1. Toasted Rosemary Croutons
  2. Heat the oven to 400. Mix everything but the bread together, then spread an equal amount on each slice. Put them on a baking sheet and into the oven until they are lightly toasted. Serve with soup!
Tags:
Contest Entries

See what other Food52ers are saying.

  • drbabs
    drbabs
  • aargersi
    aargersi
  • eliza
    eliza
aargersi

Recipe by: aargersi

Country living, garden to table cooking, recent beek, rescue all of the dogs, #adoptdontshop

Popular on Food52

6 Reviews

eliza
eliza November 12, 2014
checked on line about the possibility of dry roasting cooked grains. new to me. nothing there. i often dry roast grains BEFORE cooking them, but this recipe confounds me. i do hope the recipe offer weighs in on this one & offers clarification. thanks.
 
aargersi
aargersi November 13, 2014
Hi Eliza! Sorry for the confusion - I had cooked grains on hand, so I tossed them into a non-stick skillet without any fat added, and just toasted them that way. That was just to add a bit more nutty toasty flavor - you could just add them straight to the soup too, if you don't want to mess with that step.
 
eliza
eliza November 13, 2014
Thanks for the clarification, Abbie. Without cooked grains on hand, I cooked two of the three while the other ingredients were doing their thing. Let them cool on a plate, while the chicken cooled, stirred them around in a dry stainless steel skillet (no non stick cookware in our house -- teflon too toxic, haven't tried the new non stick pans made of ceramic). Enriched the broth with bouquet garni & roasted garlic. Topped the finished soup with lemon olive oil -- heightening the lemon flavor. Chili flakes add pizazz. Good medicine for this sick cat!
 
aargersi
aargersi November 14, 2014
I hope you get to feeling better!!!!
 
eliza
eliza November 12, 2014
hmm. need more detailed instructions about the grains. cook them first then "dry roast"? i have an inkling the process entails cooking three different grains, then toasting them in a dry skillet. is this even close? i'm going to try this soup with one grain since cooking three means three times the number of steps. i added a whole head of garlic in the roasting process. & covered the vegetable in thyme sprigs from the garden. kitchen smells like medicine.
 
drbabs
drbabs September 23, 2013
yum