This chicken verde soup is the perfect chilly spring evening soup. The flavors are warming and comforting. but the color is a beautiful bright green.
The recipe for this easy chicken verde soup is simple and extremely hands-off.
Although many recipes for chicken verde soup use salsa verde or tomatillos for the green color, our soup relies heavily on lots of cilantro and scallions. Although you won’t get the tartness that you would from tomatillos, you’ll still have a very green, very aromatic, spicy chicken soup.
For this recipe, you’ll start by boiling a whole chicken (with lots of garlic!) until the meat is falling off the bones.
You’ll strain the stock and then sauté onions until softened.
Next, you’ll add the strained stock back in with lots of roughly chopped cilantro, scallions, and sliced jalapeño. Let it cook for about 20 minutes and then add the cooked chicken back in.
The result is a simple, comforting, spicy chicken verde soup that doesn’t use a ton of ingredients but tastes like it does!
You can add even more green to this soup by serving it with sliced avocado and more cilantro and scallions on top. You’ll want to serve this with crusty, toasted bread to soak up all that delicious broth, too!
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Easy Chicken Verde Soup
Equipment
- Large soup pot
- Fine mesh sieve
- Large heat-proof bowl
Ingredients
- 3 pounds bone-in chicken
- 8 cups water more as needed
- 1 head garlic halved crosswise
- 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
- 1 yellow onion peeled and thinly sliced
- 2 jalapeños trimmed and sliced into rounds
- 1 large bunch cilantro roughly chopped, a pinch reserved for garnish
- 10 scallions trimmed and minced, a pinch reserved for garnish
- Salt and pepper to taste
For Serving:
- Toasted bread
- Sliced avocado
- Lime wedges
Instructions
Boil the Chicken:
- Place the chicken into a large soup pot and cover with 6-8 cups of water. Season liberally with salt and pepper. Add the halved garlic head and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 45 minutes until chicken is completely cooked through and falling off the bone. Remove the chicken from the pot and transfer to a bowl to cool. Remove the garlic and transfer to a plate to cool.
- Bring the broth back to a boil for 15 minutes until it reduces down a bit. (Note: you can skip this step, but I like a very rich, reduced broth).
- Strain the broth into a bowl through a fine-mesh sieve. Wipe out the pot and return it to the stove.
- Once the chicken is cool enough to handle, shred the meat and discard the skin and carcass.
- Pop the garlic cloves out of the paper and discard the paper. With a fork, mash the cloves into a paste and set aside.
Prepare the Chicken Verde Soup:
- Heat the extra virgin olive oil in a pot over medium heat. Add the sliced yellow onion and cook for 5 minutes until it begins to soften. Add the garlic paste and cook for 45 seconds. Season with salt and pepper.
- Pour in reserved chicken stock and bring to a boil. Add the cilantro, scallions, jalapeño, and shredded chicken. Reduce heat and cook for 15 minutes or until the onion is very soft and the broth is aromatic. Taste and season to your preferences. Add more water if needed. Turn off the heat.
To Serve:
- Ladle the soup into bowls and garnish with the reserved cilantro, scallions and avocado. Squeeze lime juice over each bowl. Enjoy!
