How To Make Slow Cooker Cream of Chicken Soup

From here on out, creamy chicken soup from the slow cooker shall be known as change-your-life chicken soup. Try to imagine all the goodness of chicken soup — moist, tender chicken, bites of sweet carrot and peas — but wrapped in a creamy broth flecked with black pepper.

This creamy chicken soup is how you do comfort food from the slow cooker. It’s perfect for weeknights or cozy weekends at home. All you need on the side is a spoon for slurping and a few buttered biscuits for dunking.

Creamy chicken soup from the slow cooker is easy and flavorful. This low-and-slow-cooking soup isn’t fussy, and yet it still makes for a bowl you won’t soon forget. In this recipe, traditional chicken soup ingredients like chicken and sweet and tender carrots get cooked with the savory favorites.

To turn this into a rich and creamy soup, we’ll add a little flour at the right moment and finish the soup with cream and peas to ensure the bowl you sit down to eat hits all the right notes.

This thickening trick comes from a family-favorite pot pie recipe: Sprinkle the flour over the chicken and vegetables before adding the broth, stir the flour to coat the chicken and vegetables, and then do not stir again. As the soup cooks, it might look like the flour is clumping, but as soon as you give it a stir after its long, slow cook, it will be velvety smooth.

While other creamy chicken soup recipes are thickened with a slurry of cornstarch or flour and broth at the end, this recipe cuts out that step entirely, so you don’t have an extra dish to wash.

• Combine the chicken and vegetables first. Mix together the chopped vegetables, chicken, and salt in the slow cooker first.
• Sprinkle on the flour before adding the broth. Coating the chicken and vegetables with flour before adding the broth helps the flour thicken without clumping during the long, slow cooking process.
• Cook low and slow. This recipe is best cooked on low for at least eight hours. You can cook it for up to 10 hours, but expect some of the vegetables to be falling apart if you opt for the longer cook time. It’s fine to stir the soup after about four hours, but don’t stress if the flour looks grainy or clumpy at this point.
• Stir in the cream and peas before serving. Just before serving, give the soup a couple of really good stirs while you add the cream and frozen peas (no need to thaw).

Personally, I cannot serve this soup without biscuits and black pepper, but really, this soup is so creamy and comforting that all it needs is a bowl and spoon. If you need to feed staggered diners, lean on one of the advantages of soup in the slow cooker and just set the slow cooker to warm. The soup will remain warm for up to two hours and be like a warm hug to those who come through the kitchen after work or soccer practice hungry and scrambling for something delicious to eat.