Basic Potato Leek Soup – A Couple Cooks

This potato leek soup recipe is basic and lusciously creamy! Cozy as much as a bowl of this easy fall favourite.

Right here’s a creamy soup recipe that stands above the remaining: Potato Leek Soup! There’s simply one thing about cupping your palms round a steaming bowl or mug that comforts the soul, isn’t there? This basic combines the delicate candy essence of leeks with humble potatoes and wealthy cream for a very luxurious dish. Right here’s our spin on the basic recipe: silky clean, and warming. It’s the best winter or fall soup for a gathering or a easy weeknight.
Elements in potato leek soup
Potato leek soup is a basic soup of European origin made with potatoes, leeks, broth, seasonings, and heavy cream. There are conventional variations of this dish in Welsh, Romanian and French cooking. One other variation is vichyssoise or potage Parmentier, made with related elements however served chilly.
This spin on the recipe is made the basic American method: we’ve added a couple of different elements to taste the physique of the soup like garlic and leeks. Whereas we love embracing wholesome recipes on this web site, the heavy cream actually does pull this soup collectively! It’s a small amount per serving and the milkfat helps so as to add an opulent richness. Right here’s what you’ll want:
- Salted butter
- Leeks
- Celery
- Garlic
- Russet potatoes
- Broth (vegetable or hen)
- Recent thyme
- Bay leaf
- Salt
- Heavy cream

How you can minimize and clear leeks
Leeks are a vegetable that’s a part of the onion (allium) household. They appear like a big inexperienced onion, with a white stalk that fades to mild inexperienced with darker inexperienced leaves. Leeks are sometimes a lot dirtier than inexperienced onions: sand and filth can get caught between the layers of the white portion. For that purpose, it’s essential to chop and clear leeks earlier than working with them. Right here’s the way to do it:
- Minimize off the foundation and greens: Utilizing a big chef’s knife, slice off the foundation finish of the leek. Slice off the robust darkish inexperienced prime and discard.
- Slice in half: Slice the leek in half lengthwise.
- Thinly slice into half-moons: Place each halves minimize facet down. Then use a round movement to chop the leek into skinny half-moons.
- Clear the leek slices: Leeks typically have fairly a little bit of sand and filth between the layers. Place the leek slices right into a bowl of water and the filth will settle to the underside. Use your palms to shake unfastened any seen filth.
- Dry: Scoop the leeks out of the bowl along with your palms, permitting any filth and sediment to remain on the underside of the bowl. Pat the leeks dry with a towel, and also you’re good to go!

How you can use leek greens
What’s one of the simplest ways to make use of use leek greens? Some folks say you should utilize them for vegetable broth, however others say that leek greens have the potential so as to add bitterness to recipes. Our suggestion? We discard them and add them to our compost pile: they’re nice for compost! If you happen to’re questioning the way to get began composting, right here’s our Composting 101 tutorial.
Suggestions for this potato leek soup recipe
When you’ve cleaned and chopped the leeks for this recipe, the remainder of the soup is a breeze! Listed below are a couple of extra notes on making this cozy recipe:
- Use thyme sprigs and bay leaf, or a bouquet garni. Complete herbs add taste to the soup, which you’ll take away after simmering. If you happen to like, you should utilize a bouquet garni, which ties the herbs in cheesecloth and kitchen string. This makes them simpler to take away from the pot after simmering.
- Use a normal blender, not an immersion blender. Sometimes we just like the slick methodology of inserting a stick blender proper right into a pot of soup and mixing away. However with this soup, it doesn’t get it practically creamy sufficient. We advocate fastidiously transferring to a blender (cautious! the soup is scorching).
- Don’t loosen up on the cream. Stirring in heavy cream on the finish offers simply the appropriate wealthy physique to this soup. Don’t be tempted to make use of milk: it really works, nevertheless it’s not practically as satisfying.

Methods to serve potato leek soup
How you can serve this potato leek soup when you’ve obtained a steaming pot? This pureed soup isn’t fairly a meal by itself, because it doesn’t have a supply of protein. However add a couple of extra components to make it a meal! Listed below are a couple of concepts:
Extra leek recipes
Love working with leeks? Listed below are a couple of extra leek recipes and suggestions:
This potato leek soup recipe is…
Vegetarian and gluten-free. For vegan and dairy-free, use a vegan cream substitute or cashew cream.
Description
This potato leek soup recipe is basic and lusciously creamy! Cozy as much as a bowl of this fall easy favourite.
- 3 tablespoons salted butter (or olive oil)
- 2 giant or 4 small leeks (4 cups thinly sliced), white and light-weight inexperienced components
- 3 celery ribs
- 3 garlic cloves, minced
- 2 kilos russet potatoes, peeled and small diced (5 cups diced)
- 4 cups vegetable broth or hen broth
- 1 cup water
- 3 sprigs contemporary thyme (or make a bouquet garni)
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 ¼ teaspoons kosher salt
- ½ cup heavy cream
- Chives, for garnish
- In a big pot or Dutch oven, soften the butter over medium warmth. Add the leeks, celery and garlic and cook dinner, stirring sometimes, for 7 to eight minutes till the leeks are very tender however not browned.
- Add the chopped potato, vegetable broth, water, contemporary thyme, bay leaf, and salt and produce to a simmer. Simmer for 20 minutes till the potatoes are tender. Take away the thyme and bay leaf.
- Switch to a blender and mix till clean. Add the cream and mix once more. Style and alter seasonings as desired.
- Class: Soup
- Technique: Blended
- Delicacies: Soup
- Food regimen: Vegetarian
Key phrases: Potato leek soup