Creamy, lemony, mushroom soup with roasted garlic, roast chicken, and noodles is exactly the kind of meal that warms you from the inside out.

Photo byRebecca Blackwell/ alittleandalot.com

I am the kind of person who starts craving chunky, creamy soups and stews the second the temperature drops below 65 degrees.

Usually around mid-October, I spend a few weeks simultaneously mourning the loss of summer and relishing in the comfort of sweaters, slippers, hot cups of coffee, and foods like apple pie, warm homemade bread, and bowls of creamy soup.

This is one of those recipes that I'm happy to eat all year round, but it feels especially comforting on evenings when the sun sets early and the air is crisp and cool.

Start to finish, this creamy chicken soup will take you about an hour. It reheats really well, so I like to make enough for at least a lunch or two, and even better if we can eat it again for dinner later in the week.

Photo byRebecca Blackwell/ alittleandalot.com

How to Get the Most Flavor from Mushrooms

The broth is based on a technique I picked up from the forever loved Julia Child in Mastering the Art of French Cooking.

She makes a mushroom soup in which she cooks diced mushroom stems in broth to infuse the soup with a rich, earthy flavor, then strains them out before adding the mushroom caps that have been sautéed in butter and brightened with lemon juice.

I love this technique because it allows you to make the best use of the mushroom stems, extracting their flavor and adding depth to the soup base, while utilizing my favorite way to cook mushroom caps - sautéed in butter and oil until they are caramelized, meaty, and ridiculously flavorful.

Boiling mushrooms directly in a soup does little for enhancing their flavor. Mushrooms are quite porous and will absorb a lot of liquid when boiled. This gives them a sort of squishy texture and mutes their flavor.

But, when you sauté them in butter and oil, the flavor concentrates and develop a gorgeous outer crust that is rich and delicious.

A splash of lemon brighten their flavor and adds a nice acidity to this soup that really balances out all the other flavors.

Photo byRebecca Blackwell/ alittleandalot.com

Recipe: Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup

• 4 whole heads of garlic
• ½ cup plus 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil, divided
• 16 ounces crimini (also called baby bella) or white button mushrooms
• Salt and ground black pepper
• ¼ - ½ cup lemon juice (to taste)
• 1 large white or yellow onion, peeled and roughly chopped
• 2 celery stalks, diced
• 2 large carrots, peeled and diced
• 2 anchovy fillets
• 2 teaspoon dried thyme
• 8 cups chicken broth, homemade or good quality prepared
• 1 tablespoon soy sauce
• 2 tablespoon unsalted butter
• 8 ounce wedge of parmesan cheese, with the rind
• ¼ cup chives, minced
• ¼ cup green onions, white and light green parts only, sliced thin
• ½ cup fresh parsley, chopped
• ¾ cup heavy cream
• 10 ounces udon, vermicelli, linguine, or fettuccine noodles - dried or homemade fresh pasta
• 1 small, fully cooked Roast Chicken or Rotisserie Chicken, meat removed from the bone and shredded

1. Roast the garlic: Heat the oven to 400 degrees. Peel and discard the papery outer layers of the whole garlic bulbs, leaving the bulbs intact. Using a sharp knife, cut ¼ to a ½ inch off the top of each bulb so that the individual cloves of garlic is exposed. Place the bulbs, cut side up, on a large piece of aluminum foil, folding the sides of the foil up around the bulbs. Drizzle with ¼ cup of olive oil and then wrap the foil up and around the bulbs to enclose them completely. Put the foil packet in the center of the oven and roast until the garlic is extremely soft, about 30-40 minutes. Let the garlic sit, unwrapped, until cool enough to handle. (While the garlic roasts, prepare the soup.)
2. Gently clean mushrooms with a damp paper towel. Separate the stems from the caps of the mushrooms. Dice the mushroom stems. Cut the mushroom caps into ¼-inch slices.
3. Pour ¼ olive oil into a large, heavy-bottomed saucepan or dutch oven. Add the diced mushroom stems, chopped onion, and diced celery and carrots, and set the pan over medium heat. Stir to coat the vegetables in the oil and sprinkle in about 1 teaspoon salt and 1 teaspoon pepper. Cook, stirring frequently, until the vegetables are soft, about 5 minutes.
4. Add the anchovy fillets and dried thyme to the pan and cook, stirring to break up the anchovies, for 1 minute longer. Pour in the chicken broth and soy sauce and turn the heat up to high. Cut the rind from the wedge of parmesan cheese and drop it into the broth. Once the broth begins to boil, turn the heat down to medium-low, cover the pan, and let simmer for 20 minutes.
5. While the soup base simmers, add the remaining tablespoon of olive oil and 2 tablespoons of butter to a large skillet set over medium heat. when the butter is completely melted, add the sliced mushrooms. Stir to coat with the butter and oil and sprinkle with about ½ teaspoon salt and ground black pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally until the mushrooms are a deep golden brown. Remove the pan from the heat and stir in ¼ cup lemon juice. Set aside.
6. After the broth has simmered for about 20 minutes, pour it through a colander into a bowl to strain the broth from the vegetables. Press the vegetables in the colander with the back of a spoon to express as much liquid from them as you can. Discard the vegetables and the parmesan rind and return the broth to the saucepan.
7. Set the saucepan over medium-high heat and add the chives, green onions, parsley, cream, and sautéed mushrooms. Squeeze the roasted garlic out of its papery shell into the soup. Bring to a simmer and add the noodles. Simmer just until the noodles are cooked through. How long the noodles take to cook will depend on the type of noodle you're using so refer to the package instructions. If using homemade pasta, the noodles will only take about 2 minutes.
8. Remove the saucepan from the heat and stir in the shredded chicken. Taste and add more salt, pepper, or lemon juice if desired.
9. Grate the parmesan cheese, sprinkle it over individual bowls of soup, and serve.

For more of my recipes, visit alittleandalot.com and ofbatteranddough.com.