Chef Joost
Aspergesoep (Dutch White Asparagus Soup)
White asparagus is Limburg's spring clock, and this soup uses every pale stem and peeling to make wit goud, white gold, taste like the season it refuses to outlive.
Culinary Explorer
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Koninginnesoep
Created by
French court soup put in Dutch house slippers: pale chicken stock, a careful roux, peas and carrot, and a queen's name made useful at the Sunday table.
Soups & Stews
Dutch
Dinner Party
Special Occasion
Comfort Food
25 min
Active Time
1 hr 45 min cook•2 hr 10 min total
Yield6 servings
In my grandmother's second notebook, Koninginnesoep sits between ordinary kippensoep, chicken soup, and a sherry pudding that only appeared when the good glasses had been polished. That is the first secret of it: the queen's soup lived in ordinary houses. It was the course that made a Sunday dinner feel like company had been expected, even when the company was only family.
The name already tells you it came dressed from elsewhere. Koningin is queen; the older French phrase is potage à la reine, a courtly chicken soup, pale and smooth, made for tables where soup wore titles. The Dutch did what Dutch kitchens often do to imported grandeur: kept the useful part, took off the lace cuffs, and put it into a pan that could feed six. Roux, chicken stock, a little cream, peas, carrot. Royal in name only. That is why I like it.
What matters here is restraint. Brown the flour and you have told the wrong story; this soup wants a pale roux, clean chicken stock, small vegetables cut evenly, and mace or nutmeg only as a whisper from the spice cupboard. Hou het altijd simpel, always keep it simple. A dish without its story is half a meal, but a soup with too much story in the pot is just confusion. Let it be gentle, ivory, and generous.
Potage à la reine, literally soup in the style of the queen, belongs to French courtly cookery of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, where pale poultry soups were thickened with rice, almonds, bread, or cream before later roux-based versions became common. Dutch household and hotel cookbooks borrowed the French name as koninginnesoep in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, then made it a domestic kippensoep, chicken soup, with a white roux, cream, peas, and carrot. Despite the Dutch title, no secure source ties it to one Dutch queen; its real story is French menu language made useful at the Dutch dinner table.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
small chicken or bone-in chicken thighs
Quantity
1 chicken (1.2-1.4kg) or 1.2kg thighs
cold water
Quantity
2.2 liters
onion
Quantity
1
halved
leek
Quantity
1 medium
dark green leaves washed for stock, white and light green part finely sliced for soup
carrot for stock
Quantity
1
scrubbed and roughly chopped
celery stalk or celeriac
Quantity
1 stalk or 75g
roughly chopped
bay leaves
Quantity
2
black peppercorns
Quantity
6
fine sea salt
Quantity
1 teaspoon, plus more to taste
unsalted butter
Quantity
50g
plain flour
Quantity
50g
carrots
Quantity
150g
cut into 5mm dice
cooked chicken meat from the stock
Quantity
250g
diced or shredded
fresh or frozen peas
Quantity
150g
whole milk
Quantity
200ml
cream (slagroom)
Quantity
150ml
ground mace or freshly grated nutmeg
Quantity
1/4 teaspoon
freshly ground white pepper
Quantity
to taste
finely chopped parsley (optional)
Quantity
1 tablespoon
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| small chicken or bone-in chicken thighs | 1 chicken (1.2-1.4kg) or 1.2kg thighs |
| cold water | 2.2 liters |
| onionhalved | 1 |
| leekdark green leaves washed for stock, white and light green part finely sliced for soup | 1 medium |
| carrot for stockscrubbed and roughly chopped | 1 |
| celery stalk or celeriacroughly chopped | 1 stalk or 75g |
| bay leaves | 2 |
| black peppercorns | 6 |
| fine sea salt | 1 teaspoon, plus more to taste |
| unsalted butter | 50g |
| plain flour | 50g |
| carrotscut into 5mm dice | 150g |
| cooked chicken meat from the stockdiced or shredded | 250g |
| fresh or frozen peas | 150g |
| whole milk | 200ml |
| cream (slagroom) | 150ml |
| ground mace or freshly grated nutmeg | 1/4 teaspoon |
| freshly ground white pepper | to taste |
| finely chopped parsley (optional) | 1 tablespoon |
Equipment Needed
- •Heavy 4-5 liter soup pot
- •Fine sieve
- •Whisk
- •Ladle
Instructions
- 1
Make the stock
Put the chicken, cold water, onion, dark leek leaves, rough carrot, celery or celeriac, bay leaves, peppercorns, and salt into a large pot. Bring it slowly just to a boil, skim the grey foam that rises, then lower the heat to a quiet simmer for 75 to 90 minutes, until the chicken is tender and the stock tastes properly of bird. A furious boil gives you cloudy, tired stock; the queen can wait.
If you use a true soepkip, a stewing hen, give it another hour. Older birds have better flavor, but they are not in a hurry. - 2
Strain and pull
Lift the chicken onto a plate and let it cool enough to handle. Strain the stock through a fine sieve and measure out 1.5 liters for the soup; if you have less, add a little water, and if you have more, keep the rest for another pan. Pull or dice 250g of the chicken meat and save any extra for sandwiches, because Dutch thrift is not decoration.
- 3
Build the roux
In a clean soup pot, melt the butter over medium-low heat. Add the diced carrot and the finely sliced white and light green leek, and cook for 4 minutes without browning. Stir in the flour and cook for 2 minutes, until it smells faintly like warm bread but stays pale. Add the hot stock a ladle at a time, whisking until smooth before each addition. Simmer for 12 minutes, stirring along the bottom so the flour cooks out and the soup thickens gently.
This is a white roux, not the beginning of gravy. If the flour browns, the soup will taste deeper than it should and look less like koninginnesoep. - 4
Finish gently
Stir in the milk, cream, cooked chicken, peas, and mace or nutmeg. Keep the heat low and let the soup warm through for 5 minutes, just until the peas are bright and the chicken is hot. Do not let it boil hard now; cream splits when bullied, and chicken goes dry when it has already given you its best.
- 5
Season and serve
Taste carefully and season with salt and white pepper. Ladle into warmed bowls and scatter over the parsley if you are using it. The soup should be ivory and gentle, with small green peas and orange carrot showing through, royal in name but entirely at home with bread and butter on the table.
Chef Tips
- •Use a soup chicken if your butcher has one. If not, bone-in thighs are the honest substitute; they give the stock more body than boneless breast ever will.
- •Frozen peas are welcome here. Fresh peas have a short season, and a good frozen pea was picked at the right hour and held there, which is preservation, not surrender.
- •Mace is the slightly older Dutch gesture, nutmeg the cupboard answer. Use either with a light hand; you want people to notice the chicken first and wonder about the spice second.
- •For a dinner party, make the stock a day ahead. Then the actual soup is twenty minutes of quiet work, which is exactly how a host remains human.
- •A glass of dry white wine works well, but so does a small pilsner. This soup has a French title and Dutch manners.
Advance Preparation
- •The chicken stock can be made up to 2 days ahead. Chill it quickly, refrigerate, and lift off any fat that sets on top before using.
- •The soup can be made through the roux and stock stage 1 day ahead. Add the cream, peas, and chicken when reheating so they stay clean and bright.
- •Leftovers keep 3 days in the refrigerator. Reheat gently and whisk if the cream loosens; cream soups tolerate patience better than heat.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 400g)
Calories
390 calories
Total Fat
27 g
Saturated Fat
15 g
Trans Fat
1 g
Unsaturated Fat
10 g
Cholesterol
115 mg
Sodium
560 mg
Total Carbohydrates
19 g
Dietary Fiber
3 g
Sugars
7 g
Protein
19 g
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