Creamy Chicken Marsala Soup

Snow this week. Real snow, not the dusting Nebraska pretends is a storm, but six inches Monday night and another four on Wednesday, the kind of snow that shuts the schools and makes I-80 a nightmare of jackknifed trailers and salt trucks. I drove through it because I always drive through it, because the freight doesn't stop for weather and neither do I, and because the cab of a Peterbilt in a snowstorm is one of the safest places on earth if you know what you are doing, and I know what I am doing.

Josie had a snow day Tuesday. She spent it building a snowman in the front yard with Justin, who is eleven and too old for snowmen but not too old for his little sister, and the two of them made something lumpy and beautiful with a carrot nose and one of Dave's old ball caps, and I watched from the kitchen window while making soup and thought: this is what normal looks like. This is what I am fighting for. The snowman. The kids in the yard. The soup on the stove. The ordinary Tuesday that is not ordinary at all, that is in fact a miracle, a small daily miracle of children playing while the world is cold and hard and full of things they do not yet understand.

I made potato soup — my winter standard. Potatoes, onion, chicken broth, cream, cheddar, bacon. It is the simplest soup in the world and the most satisfying. I made enough for eight people because I always make enough for eight people even when there are only six of us, because the extra goes to Gayle, always to Gayle, the woman at the end of the road who says she does not need anything and whose refrigerator tells a different story.

Dave fixed the furnace Thursday. It makes a sound now, a clicking, that was not there before, and the clicking is either nothing or something, and Dave says it is nothing, and I do not believe him, but the house is warm and the furnace runs and some things you accept on faith. The clicking has become part of the house, like the creaking step and the dripping kitchen faucet and the sound of trucks on the interstate at night, which I can hear from our bedroom if the window is cracked. I keep the window cracked. I like the sound. It means someone is driving. It means the road goes on.

That Tuesday—watching Justin and Josie through the kitchen window, the snowman taking shape, the soup on the stove—is the kind of afternoon I try to hold onto when the road gets long and the weather gets mean. The potato soup I made that day is my winter standard, but this Creamy Chicken Marsala Soup is the recipe I reach for when I want something that feels a little more like a celebration of ordinary life—the mushrooms, the wine, the cream coming together in a pot that smells like the house is doing exactly what a house is supposed to do. I always make a double batch. Gayle at the end of the road gets half.

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 40 min | Total Time: 55 min | Servings: 6

Ingredients

1 1/2 lbs boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into 1-inch pieces
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 medium yellow onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
16 oz cremini mushrooms, sliced
1/3 cup Marsala wine
4 cups low-sodium chicken broth
1 cup heavy cream
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves (or 1/2 teaspoon dried)
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
3/4 teaspoon kosher salt, plus more to taste
2 tablespoons fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped
Optional: 2 cups baby spinach, stirred in at the end

Instructions

Brown the chicken. In a large Dutch oven or heavy-bottomed pot, heat olive oil over medium-high heat. Season chicken pieces with salt and pepper. Add to the pot in a single layer and cook 4–5 minutes, turning once, until golden. Remove to a plate and set aside. The chicken doesn’t need to be cooked through at this stage.
Sauté the aromatics. Reduce heat to medium. Add butter to the pot. Once melted, add onion and cook 3–4 minutes until softened and translucent. Add garlic and cook 1 minute more, stirring constantly.
Cook the mushrooms. Add sliced mushrooms to the pot and stir to combine. Cook 6–8 minutes, stirring occasionally, until mushrooms have released their liquid and are deeply browned. Don’t rush this step—the browning is where the flavor lives.
Deglaze with Marsala. Pour in the Marsala wine and scrape up any browned bits from the bottom of the pot. Let it simmer 2 minutes until the wine reduces by about half and the sharp alcohol smell mellows.
Build the base. Sprinkle flour over the mushroom mixture and stir well to coat. Cook 1 minute, then slowly pour in the chicken broth, stirring constantly to prevent lumps. Add thyme and return the browned chicken to the pot.
Simmer. Bring the soup to a gentle boil, then reduce heat to low. Cover and simmer 15 minutes until chicken is cooked through and the broth has thickened slightly.
Add the cream. Stir in the heavy cream and, if using, the baby spinach. Simmer uncovered an additional 5 minutes. Taste and adjust salt and pepper. The soup should be rich, velvety, and just thick enough to coat the back of a spoon.
Serve. Ladle into bowls and top with fresh parsley. Serve with crusty bread for soaking up the broth.

Nutrition (per serving)

Creamy Chicken Marsala Soup — The Soup That Holds the House Together