Cream of Broccoli Soup

We love cream of broccoli soup, but I've always been a little apprehensive with making it. I've tasted too many cream soups that tasted a little like cardboard, but this one was really good. In fact my husband said it tasted like the soup from one of our favourite restaurants!

I'm going to post the original recipe and then I'll let you know about some of the changes I made.

Cream of Broccoli Soup

2 Tbsp butter
1 onion, chopped
1 stalk celery, chopped
3 cups chicken broth
8 cups broccoli florets
1 tsp chicken bouillon
dash of nutmeg
salt and pepper to taste

3 tbsp butter
3 tbsp flour
2 cups milk

Melt the butter in a large saucepan, add onions and celery and saute until tender. Add broccoli, broth, bouillon, nutmeg and salt and pepper. Simmer for 15-20 minutes or until broccoli is tender. Take your potato masher and gently mash the broccoli, I like a chunky soup so I barely mashed them at all. Meanwhile melt the 3 tbsp of butter in a smaller saucepan and stir in the flour. Now slowly add the milk, stirring in between. It should be smooth before you add more milk or else you'll get a lumpy soup. Stir this into the soup until thickened.

Now here's how I changed the recipe; I added more chicken broth, all together I used about 4 or 5 cups chicken broth. I also added about 1 cup of 18% table cream to give the soup a richer taste. With adding the extra liquid I then used 5 tbsp of butter and 5 tbsp of flour to thicken the bigger soup. I also used an extra celery stalk.

Enjoy!
Tina