Avgolemono is Greece’s answer to chicken soup: tender chicken and rice in a golden broth, thickened at the end with eggs and lemon juice until it turns silky and bright. It is comforting and fresh at the same time.

The egg and lemon step looks tricky but is easy once you know the rule: warm the eggs slowly with hot broth before they go into the pot, and never let the soup boil afterwards.

This version makes its own broth from bone-in chicken, so you get a full-flavoured soup with very little effort.

What Is It?

Avgolemono (αυγολέμονο) means ‘egg-lemon’. It is both a sauce and the name of the soup made with it. Eggs are whisked with lemon juice and tempered with hot broth, then stirred into the soup to thicken it without cream or flour.

The soup version is usually made with chicken and rice or orzo. The same sauce is also used to finish other Greek dishes, such as stuffed vine leaves, meatball soup (giouvarlakia) and lamb with greens.

It is a classic Greek comfort food, eaten in winter, for anyone feeling under the weather, and after the midnight service at Greek Easter in the form of magiritsa.

A Little History

Egg and lemon sauces have a long history around the Mediterranean. A similar sauce called agristada, thickened with egg and lemon or sour grape juice, was used by Sephardic Jewish communities, many of whom settled in Thessaloniki and other Greek cities after 1492.

In Greece, avgolemono became one of the defining flavours of home cooking, and chicken avgolemono soup a standard family dish.

Lemons grow all over Greece, and their juice, combined with eggs and broth, turned a simple chicken soup into something distinctly Greek.