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Think of this prairie chicken soup as Italian pasta e fagioli (“pasta fuhzool”) meets the Nebraska prairies. It’s a hearty soup loaded with good things — and it works with most meats, not just the hard-to-get prairie chicken.
I was lucky enough to come home with six prairie chickens after a hunt in western Nebraska, and my immediate thought was to make soup out of the one that was kind of shot up; this is my go-to move on all shot-up birds, by the way.
As some of you may know, I love creating dishes that speak of a time and place, and this is one of them. Not fancy at all, and although there are a couple ingredients that are harder to find, I’ll give you easy substitutions that still result in a wonderful prairie chicken soup.
OK, so prairie chickens. They can only be hunted in a few states — Nebraska being one of them — but I want you to be able to make this soup even if you are prairie chickenless. Here are some good alternates:
- My first suggestion would be to use the chicken’s cousin, the sharp-tailed grouse. They are virtually identical in the kitchen. Sage grouse and spruce grouse would be equally seamless.
- I’m probably not helping, unless you’re an avid grouse hunter. So my next suggestions would be jackrabbit — they live in the prairies, and are, like the prairie chicken, dark meat — hare, squirrel, or venison shoulder.
- If you want to use a light meat, try rabbit, ruffed or blue grouse, pheasant or Hungarian partridge — a great option because they too live on the prairies — turkey legs and thighs, or yes, a regular ole’ chicken.
I initially created the base for this soup by more or less following my recipe for pheasant broth, then shredding the meat off the busted-up chicken, then cooking dried, cracked corn and prairie turnips in that broth.
OK, OK, I can hear you: Where the heck do I get cracked corn and prairie turnips?
There’s only one place I know of to buy prairie turnips, and while they’re amazing, they are also expensive. Solution: Use regular turnips. As for the cracked corn, you can buy it here, make your own by drying corn and roughing it up in a food processor, or just calling it a day and using sweet corn. Sweet corn won’t be the same, but it’ll be fine.
I tasted the base and it was very meaty-starchy. Definitely needed a boost of deliciousness. So since I hunted the prairie chickens for the soup in Nebraska, I did a thing I do a lot: OK, what do they grow in Nebraska? Turns out they are the top grower of great northern beans in the United States. Bingo!
Pasta e fagioli would get a seat at the party. I’d add the white beans, cook things not in olive oil but bacon fat, and for pasta use traditional Midwestern egg noodles; I went with the “dumplings” kind because they look cool. A bit of tomato, lots of herbs from the garden, and boom — a really damn good soup.
I have some similar stews and soups that evoke the prairies, or that use grouse, such as my bison stew, three sisters stew with grouse, knoephla soup, and Scandinavian grouse soup.
Prairie Chicken Soup
Ingredients
BROTH
- 1 prairie chicken, or 2 pounds other meat (see headnotes)
- 2 bay leaves
- 2 ounces dried mushrooms (optional)
- 2 stalks celery, chopped
- 2 carrots, chopped
- 1 large onion, chopped
- Stems from one bunch of parsley
- Salt
SOUP
- 1/4 cup bacon fat, or any other fat or cooking oil
- 1 small onion, chopped
- 1 large carrot, diced
- 2 stalks celery, chopped
- 1 large clove of garlic
- Salt
- 2 teaspoons thyme or savory
- 3 tablespoons tomato paste
- 1 cup dried, cracked corn (or regular corn kernels, see below)
- 1/2 pound turnips, ideally small ones, cut into chunks
- 6 to 12 ounces egg noodles, "dumpling" style if possible
- 1 16- ounce can, great northern beans, drained and rinsed
- 1/2 cup chopped parsley
- 1/2 cup chopped chives and celery leaves (optional)
- Freshly ground black pepper to taste
Instructions
BROTH
- Cut the bird into serving pieces and cover with water. Bring to a boil, then dump the water and reserve the bird. Scrub the scum out of the pot. This process makes a light, clean broth with no weird debris in it.
- Refill the pot with cold water and add back the bird. Cover by about 3 inches of water and let this steep, steaming, until the meat is tender. This can take 4 hours with an old prairie chicken, but only about 90 minutes with a store-bought chicken. It's important to not boil the broth or it will get chalky and cloudy.
- When the meat is close to being done, add the remaining broth ingredients except for salt and cook this gently for 90 minutes more. Fish out the bird and shred all the meat off it. Reserve.
- Strain the broth through a strainer with a paper towel set inside to keep it as clean as possible. Only now do you add salt, little by little. You should have a gallon or so. This whole process can be done up to 5 days before you serve the soup.
SOUP
- In a soup pot, add the bacon fat and set the burner to medium-high. Add the onion and carrot and cook until soft, but not overly browned, about 8 minutes. Add the celery and garlic and cook another 4 minutes, stirring occasionally, then stir in the tomato paste. Cook this a few minutes. Add the thyme.
- Add the cracked corn, the shredded meat, and lots of broth, at least 2 quarts, and more if you want. Simmer this a few hours until the corn is soft. If you are using regular corn kernels, add them and the turnips now and simmer until the turnips are tender.
- Add the noodles and canned beans and cook until the noodles are ready. You might need to add more broth. Stir in chopped herbs, add salt if needed, and then the pepper. Serve steaming hot.
Notes
Keys to Success and Shortcuts
- Use premade broth to poach the bird to save time.
- Once cooked and shredded, you can keep the meat in the fridge a few days before making the soup.Â
- You can also cook the cracked corn and prairie turnips a day or two ahead of time.Â
- If you have real prairie turnips, they need to be soaked overnight and then cooked a long time. Add them when making the broth. Also, there’s a stringy center to them that needs to be pulled out when you chop them.Â
- Any combination of herbs you like will work here, or you can add greens like spinach, chard, lambsquarters or kale.Â
- I wouldn’t get mad at the addition of a little hot sauce at the end, but that might not be very Nebraskan…
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
