Creamy Chicken and Stars Soup

Creamy Chicken and Stars Soup is a deliciously satisfying and comforting homemade soup with great soulful flavor.

Creamy Chicken and Stars Soup

By Sue Lau | Palatable Pastime

This is not the brothy kind of chicken and stars you might dump from a can.

The flavor is rich, and soulful. It kind of reminds me of chicken and dumplings, except that it has tiny pasta in it instead of dumplings. It is very much a comfort food and will warm you right up.

The kind of pasta I use in this is called stelline, which perhaps comes from the word “stellar”, meaning “stars”. This is a stellar recipe! But cuteness aside, you can use any kind of small pasta in this for the same texture, and even larger pasta can be cooked into it but be a bit more chunky. You could even use thin vermicelli in it and break that up.

I made this kind of in a hurry after shopping, being late getting things done for the day, so I had grabbed one of those rotisserie chickens at the market and it worked great. There was a bit of juice in the bottom of the bag that smelled wonderful so I tossed that into the soup as well. If you are going to cook your own chicken, one about 3 1/2 pounds is an average size and will do nicely. If you have a larger one you can save the extra meat for something else like chicken salad if you prefer.

I do have a great recipe for roasting chicken if you want to use that when cooking your bird. It is a good way to make nice juicy chicken and the chicken in the soup needs to be only chopped and heated after all. If you do go the route of adding a whole bird to make your stock, it does leech some of the flavor from the meat, but on the other hand, it does add some collagen to the stock from the bones. It’s your call. But if you want the recipe for roasted chicken, I have added the link below.

Simple and Easy Roast Chicken

The soup is perfect for a wintry day, and I think it would make a great accompaniment to a sandwich or side salad. But even on its own, a large bowl full makes a hearty meal, especially if you serve it with some garlic bread or something on the side.

Creamy Chicken and Stars Soup

Servings: 6-8
Time: 45mins
Difficulty: easy
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Ingredients:

2 tbsp. olive oil
1 cup finely chopped celery
1 cup finely diced carrot
1/2 large onion, finely chopped
2-3 bay leaves
2 quarts chicken broth
1/4 teaspoon turmeric
1 1/2 teaspoons garlic paste
1 teaspoon dried thyme leaves
1 teaspoon poultry seasoning
salt and black pepper to taste
1/4 teaspoon kitchen bouquet
1 3.5-pound fully cooked or roasted chicken, meat removed and chopped (about 4 cups)
1 cup uncooked star pasta or stelline (or any other small pasta)
4 ounces cream
1/4 cup cornstarch

Method:

Saute celery, carrot, onion, bay leaves in olive oil until soft.
Stir in the chicken broth, turmeric, garlic paste, dried thyme, poultry seasoning, salt and black pepper and kitchen bouquet.
Bring to a boil, then reduce heat, cover and simmer for 10 minutes.
Add the pasta and chopped cooked chicken to the soup, return to a boil, then continue simmering for another 15 minutes or so, stirring occasionally, until pasta is tender.
Stir together the cream and cornstarch to form a slurry; stir into soup and bring to a boil, stirring constantly until soup thickens.

From the kitchen of palatablepastime.com