It’s Soup Season!
I’ll tell you a secret: in this house, it’s always Soup Season. A Big Pot of Something is my preferred weeknight meal, because turning a pile of mostly-vegetables into dinner is relentlessly satisfying, can generally be done in an hour or so, and makes for great leftovers.
As such, I have developed a rather long list of favorites. As the long nights begin and temperatures drop weekly, I’m sharing that list alongside my personal recipe notes. If I have a photo of me-made soup, I’ve included it.
A few notes:
I’m defining “soup” broadly here: curries, stews, and chilis can all comply with my definition: “I made it in a pot and eat it with a spoon.”
I’ve divided these into categories. Some of these fit in a few places (example: Finnish Salmon Soup is both indulgent and easy), but for the sake of simplicity recipes are only featured in one category.
I have bolded our top 10 favorites. All recipes are much-loved and have been made repeatedly, but the bolded recipes are most frequently in rotation
Soup Type: Cozy, Indulgent Favorites
These recipes feel like perfect winter food to me: luxurious, hearty, possibly cream-based.
Alyssa Hakanson | Chicken and Dumplings: What’s winter without chicken and dumplings? I love this easy recipe, which features a double broth and drop dumplings. A note from the future: I now make this with 2/3 of the dumpling dough; there were too many leftovers for the two of us, and I’ve decided I like a higher soup-to-dumpling ratio.
La Cuisine de Geraldine | Finnish Salmon Soup: I’ve made this soup so many times since it was shared with me. I add a little wine in before the potatoes and stock, and tend to use an onion instead of leeks (it might be more French than Finnish at this point). I prefer the flavor of dried dill here; add it in with stock and taste until it’s your preferred level of dill-y. Yes, leave the salmon skin on!
Alyssa Hakanson | Curried Chicken and Barley Soup: This recipe bravely asks, “what if chicken noodle soup was filled to the gills with aromatics and used barley instead of noodles?” And you know what? I really think it works. Long live Frankenstein Cuisine! (There are a few more on the list.)
Soup Addict | Mulligatawny Soup: I think if I were sick, I would want this one delivered to me. The addition of apples to a coconut curry soup is wonderful!! It is not a beautiful soup, but it’s fantastic.
Alyssa Hakanson | My Dad's Chili: This is a truly classic chili recipe that has won multiple chili cook-offs! Three types of beans, two types of meat. And can I interest you in a Midwestern twist to stretch the meal? Serve it on a bed of macaroni noodles topped with cheese. We call it chili-mac around here.
Soup Type: So Easy
These require very little work and punch way above their weight class in deliciousness. They’re our reliable weeknight favorites.
Budget Bytes | Lentil and Sausage Stew: This stew is quick and easy with a pretty small ingredient list. I make it with a full pound of Italian sausage, and I cook my lentils for 15-20 minutes rather than 30. Makes fantastic leftovers and freezes really well!
Smitten Kitchen | Quick Pasta and Chickpeas: This is so easy that it’s really more “assembly” than cooking. Use whatever fun tiny pasta you can find; it’s usually ditalini for me. Double it — trust me; it’s so much more delicious than it seems like it should be.
Salt and Lavender: Easy Thai Chicken Curry Soup: The pitch: chicken noodle soup, but with a bunch more flavor. It’s built as a way to use leftover rotisserie chicken, which I don’t typically have around. I add chicken with the broth, simmer about 15 minutes, remove and shred, return it to the pot, and carry on. I highly recommend adding a generous glug of fish sauce!
Alyssa Hakanson | Corn and Shrimp Chowder: Yes, it was made for peak summer veggies, but this is honestly just as good in the dead of winter. Frozen corn tastes great, and zucchini is fine in November (I love my farmers’ market produce, but we need to be honest here). It’s light, it’s easy, it’s good. Go make it!
Smitten Kitchen | Greens, Orzo, and Meatball Soup: I make this soup a little harder for myself by sautéing onion and garlic before proceeding with the broth, but I make it easier by using store-bought meatballs. I love these ones from Trader Joe’s, which happen to be less expensive than buying a pound of beef. I also love using these Simek’s mini meatballs in soups for better meat distribution. I use either fresh or frozen spinach for the greens, whatever I have on hand.
Damn Delicious | Creamy Tortellini Soup: Such a winner of a recipe, but I have one tiny quibble with the order of operations — I find it’s better to add the kale to the soup, let it wilt a bit, and then add the tortellini at the very end.
Alyssa Hakanson | Thai Red Curry and Sweet Potatoes: Nothing authentic about this, but it’s great! Cozy, fully of vegetables, great leftover, easy to throw together on a weeknight, a great way to use that container of spinach in your fridge that’s looking kind of sad.
Soup Type: Vegetarian Favorites
We try to eat vegetarian a few nights a week, and these recipes are consistently in rotation
Smitten Kitchen | Squash and Chickpea Moroccan Soup: This is such a magical pile of vegetables. I add coriander seeds alongside the cumin, use about 3 Tablespoons of lemon juice in place of the preserved lemon (which I’ve never been able to find), and add capers instead of olives. Don’t skip the yogurt or the toasted almonds! I tend to serve it over pearled couscous, which is quite a bit larger — I think it helps keep the couscous from getting lost
Smitten Kitchen | Braised Chickpeas with Zucchini and Pesto: The beauty of this recipe is in its simplicity; there’s hardly even stirring involved. Make sure you have a great broth, and this is a great use for a mandolin: I typically slice the veggies right into the pot. In about an hour, you’ll be enjoying collapsed zucchini with pockets of cheese and pesto. It’s a real treat with a great, crusty bread. It’s great leftover if you follow her notes.
Alyssa Hakanson | Coconut Sweet Potato Lentil Soup with Rice: Is this the third recipe with Thai red curry on this list? Yes, but they’re all different! I adore this soup for so many reasons: the cozy factor! the spices! the fact that it’s basically a pile of vegetables! If you can handle peeling a few sweet potatoes, you’ve got this. It’s a very filling vegetarian meal.
Smitten Kitchen | Tangy Braised Chickpeas: I’m really stretching the definition of soup here, because this is really best served with mashed potatoes. But who cares? This asks the question: what if a brisket were chickpeas instead? And the answer, surprisingly, is: it’s great! It’s in the oven a long time, but so worth it!
Smitten Kitchen | Slow-Simmered Lentils with Kale and Goat Cheese: This is from Perelman’s excellent cookbook, Smitten Kitchen Keepers, and it is the coziest use of kale and goat cheese I can imagine. I consider this one borderline life-changing.
Soup Type: Cured and Smoked Sausage
My husband loves Andouille and Chorizo, so I’ve gathered quite the collection of soups and stews with sausage as the star of the show. These are the best of them.
NYT Cooking | Lentil Soup with Smoked Sausage and Apples: A genius mix of cooked and fresh apples, this soup is on our over-and-over list. In lieu of hard cider, I use a mix of dry white wine and apple cider, which are almost always in my fridge this time of year, and I find that lentils are reliably done at the 15-20 minute mark. (I also double the mustard)
Feasting at Home | Caldo Verde: This take on a Portuguese soup is easy and delicious; I appreciate a restrained ingredient list and any chance to use a super-flavorful cured meat.
Smitten Kitchen | Sweet Potato and Sausage Soup: This is essentially a sweet potato twist on the recipe above, now that I’m looking at them. But if you needed that, now you have it
Mouth Brothels | Purple Hull Peas and Sausage Jambalaya: I made this recipe when purple hull peas showed up in our community-supported produce box. As a Midwesterner, I’d never cooked them before, and this recipe was the perfect use.
Note: some of this text is repurposed from a previous post called Ten Actually Easy Dinners, which is soup-heavy but not soup-themed. Head over there for more ideas!
