Duck soup with wild rice, einkorn sourdough bread .
Okay, it’s no secret, I love soup. What other type of food can be packed with so much nutrition? You can get all of the food groups into one delicious pot, loaded with vegetables that even the kids will eat. I tend to say every recipe I post is my favorite, but this one really is! Besides, if a recipe I test or invent is not “the best,” I toss it and you’ll never hear about it. Life’s too short for so-so food. So, trust me: This soup is to-die-for delicious!
Some of the ingredients, fresh from the garden!
Once a year, around the winter holidays, I’ll roast a duck (or a chicken or turkey). There’s usually enough meat left on the bones to make this soup and still use the bones for a future poultry stock. I’m not usually ready to make soup as soon as holiday leftovers are consumed, so I’ll stick the carcass in the freezer for another cold winter day. The recipe is a little bit of work, but so worth it and any leftovers freeze really well.
The recipe has two steps. The first is to make the broth, the second is to add the final ingredients that make this a very hearty and delicious soup. Serve with Einkorn biscuits or sourdough bread and a side salad and you’ll have a nourishing, satisfying meal that everyone will love.
So here we go:
Duck Soup with Wild Rice Recipe
A hearty and delicious soup, made with a leftover duck carcass, fresh vegetables, wild rice and mushrooms and flavored with smoked ham, sherry and curry powder.
Please note that the wild rice needs to be cooked separately, which can be done while waiting for the stock to cook. The rice will take 30-45 minutes. Prep time about 60 minutes; cook time 4+ hours.
Yield: 2 quarts of soup
Ingredients for making the stock
• 1 roast duck carcass preferably with some meat on it (can substitute chicken or turkey)
• 1 smoked ham hock
• 1 med onion, quartered
• 2 stalks celery, large chunks
• 2 whole carrots, large chunks
• 2-3 garlic cloves, smashed
• 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tbsp Kitchen Bouquet (optional)
• 1 bay leaf
• filtered water: enough to cover the bones & vegs
Instructions
1. Place all of the stock ingredients into a large pot.
2. Heat to a boil and then reduce heat so it stays at a simmer.
3. Summer for 2-3 hours, until vegetables are very soft and meat is falling off the bones.
4. Scoop or strain out the vegetables and carcass and return the stock to the pot.
5. Remove any meat from bones and return the meat to the stock. You can freeze the bones for a future poultry stock and compost the spent vegetables.
Ingredients for the soup
• 1/4 cup butter
• 2 cups cooked wild rice (about 3/4 cup raw)
• 2 tbsp almonds, sliced
• 1 small onion, diced
• 1 whole carrot, diced
• 1 c mushrooms sliced or quartered
• 2 tsp curry powder
• 1/2 cup sherry corn starch (optional, for thickening if you want)
• My Secret Ingredient (or salt & pepper) to taste
Instructions
1. Sauté the first 6 SOUP ingredients in the butter (don’t add the curry, sherry, cornstarch or seasoning yet) until the vegetables start to soften, 10-15 mins.
2. Add sautéed ingredients to the stock, add the curry and sherry, and simmer for 1-1/4 hours. Add seasoning to taste. Can be thickened with corn starch if desired. Enjoy!
You can find a printable version of the Duck Soup with Wild Rice recipe here.
Deb Tejada is an urban farmer, foodie, do-it-yourselfer, graphic designer, illustrator and web developer living in sunny Colorado. When she’s not in the kitchen or garden, you can find her at The Herban Farmer. Read all of Deb’s MOTHER EARTH NEWS posts here.
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