Greek Family-style Restaurant Cream of chicken rice "Sunday

I lived in Illinois, in the Lincolnwood area most of my life and grew up going to Greek family style restaurants such as Sanders, Seven Brothers, and Omega.
These places had (and most still do) a Sunday soup called Cream of Chicken rice. Some places had traditional Avgolemano, but most had just the really thick, creamy cream soup.
I now live in Florida and miss that soup beyond belief. I want to know if anyone knows how to make it.
From what I know, its broth, milk, rice, and some flout or cornstarch for thickening. But when I attempted to make it, it didn't taste right.
I do know there was no celery of veggies in it, so it must be seasonings I am missing.
If anyone actually worked at one of these type of restaurants or knows how to make this particular style of the soup, please let me know.
Down here there is traditional Avgolemano, but, imho, it is way too thin a soup.
I like the creamy white one and I like adding actual squeezed lemon to it myself after its cooked.
Please share if you know anything about what I'm referring to.
Thanks!

Welcome to LTH Forum. After reading your inquiry, I checked the St. Demetrios Church cookbook that I inherited (1992 edition), but no luck. You might try to find cookbooks from other Greek churches to see if you have better luck.

Failing that, here are two methods that might get you the texture that you are interested in.

1. Cook veggies like celery, carrot, leeks and potatoes in your chicken stock. The proportions would be something like 1 peeled and diced carrot, 1 cup diced celery, 3 cups sliced leeks, and 2 cups peeled and diced potatoes. Saute the carrots, leeks and celery first in your soup pot for about 15 minutes. Then add potatoes and 4 cups stock, and simmer. When they are all tender, puree for a nice thick soup base. To that you can add the chicken pieces and other veggies that you want to keep whole. Right before you serve the soup, you might want to add 1 cup milk or cream if you are looking for more of a dairy creaminess.

2. Cook your soup using whatever recipe you like. When soup is done, thicken it by making a roux in a second soup pot. Melt 3 tablespoons butter then add 3 tablespoons flour. Let it brown a few minutes, then gently stir to make a paste. If necessary, add more flour until you reach a paste consistency. Cook until it is golden in color, then begin adding hot broth (just the liquid) from soup, about a 1/4 cup at a time and mix in. It will start out about the thickness of peanut butter, and gradually become thinner as you add more hot broth. After a cup or two of broth has been mixed in, then you can add the rest of the soup. The roux will thicken your soup, and add a buttery richness. Not sure if that is the missing flavor that you are looking for.

Good luck with your quest!

The soup itself did not have a buttery undertone, although some restaurants do have that instead. This, that I like is more a really thick, white cream of chickrn rice with some sort of spices. I am going to try some of the veggies you mentioned. and search for Greek spices too.
I cannot believe that something like this, which the restaurant makes by the barrel full it seems, would be so hard to figure out.
I wish I knew someone who could analyze food ingedients from an example. Lol!

qtpi1969 wrote:The soup itself did not have a buttery undertone, although some restaurants do have that instead.

In that case, use a slurry of corn starch mixed with cold water. Add it a little bit at a time to your boiling soup until the desired thickness happens.

If you start with chicken broth and add long grain rice and bring to a simmer until the rice cooks through and gets very tender (approx 45 mins - 1 hr), then add your slurry, you should get the results you are after. DO NOT rinse the rice first. The starch in the rice will help thicken the soup, so you may not need all that much corn starch slurry.