By now you likely know that I am a BIG fan of my crock pot. I’ve been throwing something in the crock pot just about every Sunday so that I have lunches done for the week.
As much as I love my go-to crock pot recipes, I kind of wanted to try something different. I went to some of my favorite blogs to look around, but nothing was jumping out at me. I remembered I had bought some buffalo sauce at the store recently, and soup was sounding really good (it’s about 30 degrees here in Kentucky right now) so I thought I’d give it a whirl!
This recipe is great and can be changed up to suit you however you want. I added the “hidden” veggies in there to give the broth a creamy consistency and also to get my husband to eat it without seeing big chunks of veggies floating around. It turned out really great, and I’ll definitely make it again!
When I had my husband try it he said: “That’s good.” Takes another bite… “I’d eat that. I really like it!”
Haha…in my book, that’s a WIN!
Creamy Buffalo Chicken Soup
Prep time: 10 mins Cook time: 8 hours Total time: 8 hours 10 mins Serves: 6
Ingredients
4 boneless skinless chicken breasts (this was a little over 2lbs raw)
6 cups low sodium free range chicken broth (or homemade stock or broth)
1 cup buffalo sauce (More or less to taste. Look at ingredients, some are much more legit than others. I used Frank's buffalo)
3 cloves garlic, minced
½ medium onion, sliced
4oz (1/2 brick) greek cream cheese (if you can't find greek cream cheese, light will be fine)
12 oz cauliflower (steamed)
10 stalks (approx 1 heart) celery, chopped
1 medium zucchini chopped (or any other veggie you want to throw in there)
Instructions
Place the chicken breasts, broth, buffalo sauce, minced garlic, onion, and cream cheese in the crock pot and stir to combine.
Turn crock pot on low.
After about 4-5 hours, steam the cauliflower. You could also throw cauliflower in at the beginning but it might be harder to fish out the chicken.
Remove the 4 breasts from the crock pot and place on a plate.
Add the cauliflower to the crock pot and use an immersion blender to blend up the cauliflower and onions. This will leave the broth slightly thicker and creamier.
Add the chicken breasts back into the crock pot.
Chop up the celery and other veggies (zucchini) and add to the crock pot.
Continue to cook on low for another 2-3 hours.
Remove the breasts and shred the chicken with two forks.
Place the chicken back in the crock pot and stir to combine.
Top with sour cream, additional buffalo sauce, green onion, a sprinkle of cheese, etc.
**If you want to try this recipe but you aren’t going to be home most of the day, I think it would turn out if you just threw everything in the crock pot at the beginning. If you wanted a smooth and creamy consistency you could remove the chicken breasts and immerse all of the vegetables (or take some out with the chicken to add texture) and then shred the chicken and add it back in. If you are leaving it all day to cook, 7 hours should be plenty - on low.
I’d love to hear what you think if you give this a try!