Creamy Chicken Sausage Soup

Every year, instead of buying my coworkers Christmas gifts, I make them lunch. It is always a huge hit! This year I made this amazing tortellini soup from Pinch of Yum. It was amazing, all my coworkers wanted the recipe, and we lived happily ever after.

Ever since, I have been craving the creamy, slightly spicy red sauce. However, my pants do not support eating tortellini every day forever and I've been dabbling in lower-carb, higher-fat eating lately. I basically replaced the tortellini with chicken, but tried to keep the spices the same. Here's what I came up with.

What you need:
(I'm all about options so list a few possibilities. However, when I calculate nutrition values, I enter what I used, so if you adjust the recipe, keep that in mind!)

• 10 oz turkey sausage, or 1 lb. Italian sausage
• 3 carrots, chopped
• 3-4 celery slices, chopped
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1/2-1 t. Italian seasoning (I used 1 teaspoon since turkey sausage isn't as flavorful as Italian sausage)
• 1/2 t. kosher salt
• 1/2 t. black pepper
• 1 t. fennel, roughly chopped
• 1 bell pepper, chopped
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 6 oz can tomato paste
• 1/2 C white wine
• 1/2 C almond flour, or any flour
• 4 C chicken stock
• 2-3 chicken breasts or your favorite part, mine weighed in at 1 lb 9 oz

• a huge handful of spinach, roughly chopped
• 1.5 C half and half or heavy cream

What to do:

These are instant pot directions but you could do it all on the stovetop, or start on the stove and move to a crockpot.

1. Use the saute function on your pressure cooker, or a large frying pan on the stove on medium-high heat. Saute the sausage in a bit of olive oil. Break it up well. The sausages I was using were a little stubborn so I pulled them out to chop up a little after they were browned.
2. Add carrots, celery, and onion, and saute for several minutes until soft. 
3. Add garlic, salt, pepper, Italian seasoning, fennel, and tomato paste. Saute for a minute while stirring.
4. Add wine and stir
5. Add flour and stir
6. Add broth and chicken. Switch to "slow cooker" and set for 6 hours. *see below if cooking on stovetop or slow cooker instead of pressure cooker.**
7. Pull chicken out and shred or cut into chunks, depending on your preference. 
8.  After the chicken is cooked, turn off the heat or switch to "keep warm" and add the half and half and spinach. Stir to combine and serve!

For slow cooker: follow steps 1-6 on stovetop, then transfer mixture to slow cooker before adding broth & chicken. I'd guess 4 hours on high or 8 hours on low, but haven't tested this. If you do, let me know how it turns out! Do steps 7-8 when chicken is done. 

Stovetop: follow all directions, turn down to low heat and cook until chicken is cooked through. Add half and half and spinach at the end of cooking. 

Makes about 9 servings of 1.5 cups. Nutrition info

Nutrition Facts
Servings 9.0
Amount Per Serving
calories 268
% Daily Value *
Total Fat 12 g	18 %
Saturated Fat 5 g	25 %
Monounsaturated Fat 3 g
Polyunsaturated Fat 0 g
Trans Fat 0 g
Cholesterol 88 mg	29 %
Sodium 816 mg	34 %
Potassium 343 mg	10 %
Total Carbohydrate 15 g	5 %
Dietary Fiber 3 g	11 %
Sugars 8 g
Protein 25 g	49 %
Vitamin A	114 %
Vitamin C	53 %
Calcium	17 %
Iron	7 %
* The Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet, so your values may change depending on your calorie needs. The values here may not be 100% accurate because the recipes have not been professionally evaluated nor have they been evaluated by the U.S. FDA.