Easy Creamy Vegetable Soup

This creamy vegetable soup is a quick and easy one-pot meal that’s perfect for a busy weeknight. It’s made with simple ingredients that you probably already have on hand, and it comes together in under 35 minutes.

Watch the Video

Creamy Vegetable Soup Recipe Video

Related: For a more brothy vegetable soup, try our Easy Homemade Vegetable Soup (it’s made with lots of veggies and a light tomato broth).

How to Make the Best Creamy Vegetable Soup

We have been making this soup for years. It’s simple to make, healthy, and comforting. Throw lots of vegetables into a big pot, add stock and herbs, and then simmer until done. Blend with a little cream or coconut milk, and you are done.This creamy veggie soup comes together quickly and it’s easy to adapt for different diets. Make it gluten-free, vegetarian, or vegan. I’ve shared how below.

Creamy Vegetable Soup

The real trick to making this soup is cutting all the vegetables a similar size. We start by cooking onions, carrots, and celery in a big pot until softened. Then we add potatoes, garlic, stock, and herbs.

Adding the Vegetables
Add thyme and bay leaves

After simmering for 15 minutes, the vegetables will be soft. Remove the herbs (I cannot even count how many times I’ve forgotten a bay leaf!). Then blend the soup until smooth.

At this point, we like to add a splash of cream or half-and-half. You can skip it or use a dairy-free option like coconut milk.

More: If you love creamy soups, take a look at our broccoli cheddar soup. We use a similar method to make it!

Substitutions for Gluten-Free, Vegetarian, and Vegan Diets

This creamy vegetable soup recipe is easy to adapt. Here’s how to substitute for different diets:

  • Gluten-free Vegetable Soup: Some store-bought stocks contain gluten. Look for stock or broth that mentions it is gluten-free on the packaging. You could also consider using homemade stock.
  • Vegetarian and Vegan Vegetable Soup: Replace the chicken stock with vegetable stock. For the best flavor, we recommend one that’s heavy on mushrooms. Instead of the cream, use coconut milk. You could also add some drained and rinsed white beans to the soup while it simmers. Once blended, they will add to the soup’s creamy texture.

Make Ahead Tips

Refrigerate the soup for up to 3 days. Or, freeze up to 3 months. The soup will become very thick after freezing. When reheating, add more stock or water to thin it out until your desired consistency.

More Easy Soup Recipes

  • Easy Sausage and Potato Soup — You will love this easy potato soup recipe with Italian sausage, potatoes, garlic, and kale.
  • Simple Ham and Cabbage Soup — This soup with cabbage and ham is hearty, healthy, easy to make, and tastes fantastic.
  • Three Ingredient Tomato Soup — You wouldn’t think that three ingredients — butter, onion, and tomato — can come together to make such a velvety and delicious tomato soup, but let me tell you. They can.
  • Creamy Homemade Potato Soup — You will love this easy soup with potatoes, veggies, garlic, and a luscious creamy broth.
  • Lentil Soup with Lemon and Turmeric — Meet my go-to lentil soup recipe! I make this soup with lentils, carrots, turmeric, and fresh lemon whenever I’m in need of some healthy comfort food.
  • Lemony Chicken Vegetable Soup — This lemon chicken and vegetable soup checks all the boxes. It’s hearty, healthy, satisfying, and tastes incredible.
  • Roasted Butternut Squash Soup — Butternut squash is roasted on top of garlic cloves and fresh thyme then blended with stock into a silky smooth butternut squash soup.

Recipe updated, originally posted December 2011. Since posting this in 2011, we have tweaked the recipe to be more clear. – Adam and Joanne

A Bowl of Creamy Vegetable Soup

Easy Creamy Vegetable Soup

  • PREP
  • COOK
  • TOTAL

This creamy vegetable soup can be refrigerated up to 3 days and kept in the freezer for up to 3 months. For a vegetarian or vegan version of this soup, replace chicken stock with vegetable stock. For the best flavor, we recommend one that’s heavy on mushrooms. Instead of the cream, use coconut milk.

Makes 4 to 5 Servings

Watch Us Make the Recipe

You Will Need

1 large onion

1 pound carrots, peeled (4 to 5 medium)

4 celery sticks

1 tablespoon olive oil

Salt

1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

1 pound thin-skinned potatoes (3 medium or 6 small potatoes)

3 garlic cloves, peeled and halved

3 cups chicken or vegetable stock, see how to make chicken stock

2 bay leaves

3 sprigs fresh thyme (substitute 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme)

1/4 cup half-and-half, cream, or coconut milk

Directions

  • Prepare Soup
  • 1Chop the onion, carrots, and celery into 1/2-inch chunks. Chop the potatoes into 1/2-inch chunks, but set aside from other vegetables.

    2Heat the oil in a large pot over medium-high heat. Toss the onion, carrots, and the celery around in the oil. Sprinkle with a 1/2 teaspoon of salt and add the red pepper flakes. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables sweat, soften, and smell sweet; 5 to 10 minutes.

    3Stir in the potatoes, garlic, bay leaves, and thyme. Cook for 5 minutes. (Add more oil if the pot seems dry).

    4Pour in the stock and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook until you can easily pierce the potatoes with a fork; about 15 minutes.

  • To Finish
  • 1Remove the soup from the heat. Take out the bay leaves and thyme sprigs and discard. Use an immersion blender, stand blender, or food mill to puree the soup until smooth.

    2Stir in the half-and-half. Taste for seasoning and adjust with more salt and pepper if necessary.

Adam and Joanne's Tips

  • Nutrition Facts: The nutrition facts provided below are estimates. We have used the USDA Supertracker recipe calculator to calculate approximate values. We did include 1/4 cup of half and half in the calculations and assumed 4 servings. We omitted salt from the calculations since you will need to add to your tastes.

If you make this recipe, snap a photo and hashtag it #inspiredtaste — We love to see your creations on Instagram and Facebook! Find us: @inspiredtaste

Nutrition Per Serving Calories 234 / Protein 6 g / Carbohydrate 41 g / Dietary Fiber 7 g / Total Sugars 8 g / Total Fat 6 g / Saturated Fat 2 g / Cholesterol 6 mg
AUTHOR:  Adam and Joanne Gallagher
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137 comments… Leave a Review
  • Jaklin Tasirmaz January 17, 2024, 8:58 am

    SUPER!!! Merci

    Reply
  • Patty Englert December 3, 2023, 4:37 pm

    I added sweet potatoes – 2 sweet, 2 regular and a touch of brown sugar. This is good and was easy!

    Reply
  • Lucy September 30, 2023, 3:17 pm

    Great flavors. Definitely a keeper! Thanks for sharing.

    Reply
  • Debbie April 19, 2023, 6:40 pm

    Hi – I just found your recipes and can’t wait to make these – I’m 67 and a vegetarian and live in Yakima and eat tons of Walla Walla onions and come to Walla Walla with our Yakima Pippins Baseball every summer God’s Blessings

    Reply
  • Amy Hare March 20, 2023, 8:30 pm

    What a delicious and flexible recipe. I opted for the vegetable stock, used an herbed oil for added flavor, one of my potatoes was sweet, added string beans, and chose the coconut milk. Didn’t use any salt and didn’t need it. Only pureed half of it to leave some chunky bits. Can’t imagine making this soup the same way twice! Thanks so much for this recipe. Can you really freeze it?

    Reply
    • Joanne April 11, 2023, 4:29 pm

      Glad you enjoyed it! Yes, this soup freezes well.

      Reply
  • JustCallMeBetty March 15, 2023, 12:41 pm

    Just the thing for a still very much winter day! Love the bit of heat from the chili flakes. I added a red pepper, a bit of garam masala and squeezed a bit of fresh lime juice into the bowl 😊

    Reply
  • Dorothy Eagan January 30, 2023, 3:47 pm

    This is such a great soup! I had a blended vegetable soup in Ireland and came home wanting to duplicate it. I found your recipe and it is wonderful! The best part is you can use any vegetables on hand to make a beautiful and healthy soup. I also added sweet potatoes, spinach, cauliflower, fresh rosemary and white beans. Absolute perfection and good healthy eating. Thank you so much!

    Reply
    • Joanne January 31, 2023, 1:25 pm

      Hi Dorothy, we are thrilled that you have our soup recipe a try! Thanks for coming back and letting us know how much you enjoyed it.

      Reply
  • Kristin Tait December 7, 2022, 3:21 pm

    I made this soup today and subbed the potatoes for sweet potatoes and used coconut milk. Oh my goodness is it ever delicious. Thank you for the wonderful recipe, it will be on repeat in my house now.

    Reply
  • JayH December 4, 2022, 10:33 pm

    Used many leftover veg plus broccoli stalks. I added a 1/4 cup of sugar to take away from their bitter. Thank you for the tip of adding Parm cheese and chilli flakes! This is my lunch all week.

    Reply
    • JayH December 4, 2022, 10:36 pm

      Oh, I used zucchini instead of potatoes, too. And a lot of cauliflower (which I don’t like raw, but I like it in this soup!)

      Reply
  • Caroline-Jayne Malpas January 4, 2022, 2:28 pm

    This soup was an absolute life saver for me, due to the fact of my daughter-in-law turning up on Christmas Day and telling me she had turned vegetarian. The main meal was covered but I needed a quick and delicious soup recipe. This ticked all the boxes and everyone ended up having it as a starter. Made it tonight for the third time since Christmas. It’s one of my families firm favourites now. Thank you!

    Reply
  • Natalie A. December 30, 2021, 6:13 pm

    This is an incredibly delicious soup. I added beets and parsnip. I think most root veggies would work. I also used oat milk instead of cram. Blended beautifully and is really good. Thank you for this great recipe.

    Reply
  • TerryF October 29, 2021, 2:32 pm

    What a delicious soup! Easy and quick to make with ingredients most of us always have in our kitchen. Thank you!

    Reply
    • Marina July 11, 2023, 12:40 am

      OMG! I just got done making this for my newly 1 year old baby boy. I haven’t giving it to him yet because it’s 12:30 am and he’s sleeping. Between work, the baby, sports, household duties, etc. I sometimes cook when everyone is sleeping so dinner is ready for the next day. However, I just had some to see if he’d like it and all I can say is omg! It tastes just the soup I was obsessed with when we’d go to restaurants while on vacation in Portugal with my grandparents. It brought back so many wonderful memories! I will definitely be making this many more times. I’ll be taking some to work tomorrow for lunchso hopefuly there will be enough for everyone for dinner..cant make any promises lol shh don’t tell no one! Thank you so much for posting this!

      Reply
  • HOLLY October 22, 2021, 9:59 pm

    OMG soooo good! Just learning about making soups and this was a great start. I used beets and sweet potatoes in place of potatoes and it didn’t miss a beat. Not sure I needed half and half but it didn’t hurt! Thanks for this wonderful recipe 🙂

    Reply

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