Wild Allium Rice Soup
A green allium soup thickened with rice, rebuilt so it packs dry and cooks in one pot.
- calories
- 520
- weight
- 4.2 oz
- cal / oz
- 124
- protein
- 9 g
- serves
- 1, scales
- prep
- 5 min
- cook
- 22 min
- total time
- 27 min
- water
- 700 ml boiled
- cost
- $
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dinner
- Lunch
- Canister stove
- Liquid fuel
- Campfire coals
- Backpacking
- Basecamp
- Car camping
- Gluten free
- Nut free
- One pot
- Pre-mix at home
- Shelf stable
- Basic
Ingredients
| Long grain white rice | 1/3 cup | thickens the pot as it breaks down |
|---|---|---|
| Chicken bouillon | 1 cube or 1 tsp powder | |
| Dried celery flakes | 1 tbsp | |
| Dried shallot or minced onion | 1 tbsp | dried ramp bulbs if you have them |
| Garlic powder | 1/2 tsp | |
| Powdered whole milk | 3 tbsp | stands in for the heavy cream |
| Olive oil | 1 tbsp | dropper bottle |
| Wild garlic or ramp leaves | 2 large handfuls | picked that day; dried leek or chive flakes work at 2 tbsp |
| Salt and white pepper | to taste |
Method
- Bring 700 ml of water to a boil. Stir in the rice, bouillon, celery, shallot, and garlic powder.
- Drop to a low simmer with the lid on. Twenty minutes, stirring when you walk past, until the rice is soft and the pot has gone cloudy.
- Chop the allium leaves small and stir them in. Thirty seconds is enough. Longer and the green turns army brown.
- Kill the heat. Whisk in the milk powder and the oil, then salt and pepper.
- Mash it against the side of the pot with your spoon if you want it thicker. There is no blender out here.
The original leans on butter, cream, white wine, and a blender. None of those travel. Rice does the thickening either way, so that part survived the trip intact: it simmers down and clouds the broth without turning it into paste, which is why the source used it instead of flour. Milk powder and olive oil, stirred in off the heat, cover what the cream was doing.
The leaves are the whole point and they go in last. Wild alliums lose their color and their sharpness in under a minute of boiling, so treat them like a garnish you happen to stir under. Fibrous species — field garlic, wild onion — are stringy in a pot you cannot strain, so chop them fine or pick something broad-leafed. Know your plant before you pick it.
Packing
Rice, bouillon, celery, shallot, and garlic powder go in one bag. Milk powder rides in its own bag so it does not clump against the salt. Oil separate.
Variations
- Cold-country version: swap the milk powder for 1 oz of crumbled hard cheese.
- No foraged greens, no problem. Two tablespoons of dried chives or leek flakes go in with the rice instead.
- Instant rice cuts the simmer to five minutes and most of the fuel, at the cost of body.
https://foragerchef.com/wild-garlic-soup