Cream of Chanterelle Soup

It has turned out to be a most abundant mushroom season so far, and we have been faced with the very good problem of asking ourselves daily, “What to do with all these Chanterelles?” Last week we received some culinary inspiration from a friend who was making large batches of cream of mushroom soup to freeze for her recipes throughout the year. Since we can’t get enough of cream of Chanterelle soup in this house, we decided to spend one evening last week making up a big ol’ batch to put some easy meals away for the winter. My partner had a favorite recipe he had been using every fall, so we stocked up on half and half, rolled up our sleeves and got to work.

I don’t think I could even begin to tell you how many pounds of Chanterelles we brushed off and sliced up, but it made a good dent in our stockpile on the back porch.

First we dry sauteed the mushrooms to get all the moisture out. With the rains we’ve been having lately, they were pretty saturated, and we didn’t want to throw off liquid ratios for the soup.

Then we sauteed up all the onions and garlic, adding the mushrooms eventually and a bunch of parsley a friend gave us from their CSA box. 

There were lots of good things happening on the stove, and the aromas were mouth watering.

Finally we divided everything into two stock pots and simmered the soup to blend all those fantastic flavors.

I happened to have a lot of quart jars around, and have found that if they aren’t filled to full to allow room for liquid expansion in the frozen state, they work great for freezing. We put away 8 quarts in the freezer for some gourmet instant meals on those on-the-go evenings.

Here is that recipe, so those of you who are in the same situation of being inundated with wild mushrooms can put them to good use.

Cream of Chanterelle Soup

4 Tbsp butter

1/2 cup onion

2 Tbsp flour

2 cups broth

2 cups half and half

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper
fresh garlic to taste (optional)
dash of nutmeg to taste (optional)

Melt butter and saute onion for two minutes. Add dry sauteed mushrooms in whatever quantity suits you and saute another 5 minutes. Add flour and saute 1 minute. Add broth and boil 1 minute, then simmer for 5 minutes. Add half and half and simmer for 10 minutes.