Healthy Potato Soup
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Healthy Potato Soup is total comfort food! This easy creamy potato soup can be made on the stove, in the slow cooker or instant pot.
Healthy Potato Soup. I mean.. do we really need to say more?
This soup is a DREAM come true. All the flavor of regular loaded baked potato soup with WAY better ingredients, and about 1/4 the calories/fat you’d normally find in it while still being rich and creamy!
It’s incredibly easy to make in your crockpot, instant pot or on the stove. IT’s totally fool proof and tastes just like the ‘real’ thing!
This potato soup is dairy free, gluten free, paleo, Whole30 friendly and vegan so everyone can enjoy it! You can also customize to your liking and I’ve listed ALL the substitutions below for you.
Liz’s Tips for the Best Potato Soup
Cut your potatoes small – Regardless of whether you make this in the instant pot, crockpot or stove top – you’ll want to make your potatoes small. The smaller they are, the quicker they will cook! You don’t want to have huge chunks of potatoes that take too long to cook.
Thicker soup – if you prefer a thicker soup, you can leave some of the potatoes out rather than blending. Blend 3/4 of the mixture and stir in the remaining 1/4 of the thicker chunks.
Get a food processor – This will make chopping your carrots, onion, and celery SO simple.
Get a good vegetable peeler – If you are going to peel your potatoes, having a good peeler helps! This vegetable peeler is my favorite.
Ingredients
Substitutions
Olive Oil: You can substitute olive oil with avocado oil or melted butter.
Potatoes: You can use any potatoes in this recipe; red, baby, russet, and yellow will all work. Russet potatoes are starchier, so they will give you a thicker potato soup and are the best potatoes for soup in our opinion. If you prefer a creamier, lighter texture potato soup, Yukon gold potatoes or red potatoes are probably a better option.
Peeling potatoes: You don’t have to peel the potatoes in this recipe. I prefer them without the skins, but if you prefer them with the skins on, keep them on!
Milk: You can use any milk you’d like in this recipe. Canned coconut milk is higher in fat, which mimics the taste/texture of heavy cream which is typically used in potato soup. The coconut milk does not taste like coconut, but if you’re worried about that or you don’t have it on hand you can use almond milk, light coconut milk, skim milk, whole milk, or even heavy cream.
Veggies: Feel free to add or omit more onions, celery, or carrots to this recipe. Cauliflower would also be a great addition! If you like a veggie packed soup, try our Healthy Cauliflower Soup or Veggie Soup recipe. If you like leeks, try our Potato Leek Soup!
Herbs: If you don’t have fresh rosemary, you can use 1/4 teaspoon dried rosemary. If you don’t like rosemary, you can also use thyme or parsley.
Broth: You can make this with bone broth, vegetable broth, or chicken broth/beef broth – any broth will work. I would recommend looking for low sodium broth.
Blender: You can use an immersion blender, regular blender, or food processor to make this potato soup creamy.
To make soup chunkier: To make this soup chunkier, I recommend only pureeing some of it. You can mash some of the potatoes directly in the pot, and puree the rest. Stir the puree in with the chunks. You also may like this Instant Pot Potato Soup.
How do you make potato soup thicker? To thicken, I add 1/4 cup of flour to a bowl and scoop out about 1 cup of liquid from the soup pot. Whisk the flour and broth mixture together until it’s a thick paste consistency. Stir it into the soup and bring to a boil for 2-3 minutes, stirring continually.. You can add more flour directly to the pot and stir it in if necessary.
Adding Ham: Many people enjoy ham in their potato soup. We have a Ham & Potato Soup Recipe or you can add ham to this after pureeing it.
Sweet Potatoes: Try our Sweet Potato Soup.
How to make healthy potato soup
You can make this delicious potato soup in your instant pot, slow cooker or on the stovetop.
- First, sauté veggies until soft. Scrape all veggies off the bottom of the pressure cooker to avoid getting a burn error. Stir in potatoes.
- Add broth + stir. Set your instant pot to pressure cook for 10 minutes.
- When done cooking – blend with an immersion blender or blender. (A food processor would also work but it might be a little tough to do/messy!)
Storage:
Refrigerator: This soup will last for up to 4 days in the refrigerator. It may separate a little when stored. Just stir it up well.
Freezing: You can freeze this healthy potato soup recipe but it’s not our favorite soup to freeze. Sometimes potatoes can get gritty when frozen/shawed.
Freeze your potato soup in an airtight containers. I love these containers for freezing leftovers!
When you’re ready to thaw, defrost the night before by leaving this in the fridge, or take out of the refrigerator and heat over the stove/in the microwave.
Separation is normal and ok! Just stir it up. We have a whole post on the best way to freeze soup!
Reheating: You can reheat this potato soup in a pot on the stove or in the microwave.
Can potato soup be canned? I have not tried canning this soup. I’d check out this post and do your own research on whether canning this soup is safe.
Toppings for Skinny Potato Soup:
There really is no wrong way for how to serve this potato soup. We love it with a loaf of sourdough bread, or with a side of some green beans and crockpot whole chicken for a more balanced meal.
Here are some of our favorite healthy potato soup toppings:
- Bacon – Regular or turkey bacon both work!
- Chives
- Cheddar Cheese
- Sour Cream or Greek Yogurt
- Cracked Black Pepper
- Crackers
Tips for blending hot soup:
You can blend this soup with an immersion blender, regular blender, or even a food processor.
Make sure to be very careful when blending soup in a regular blender. If you are blending hot soup, it can lead the blender to steam up or build pressure which can result in the top popping off. To avoid that, here are our tips for blending hot soup in a regular blender.
Allow the soup to cool for a few minutes if you can. It’s best not to take this right off the stove/instant pot/crockpot and put it in the blender. Give it a few minutes uncovered/off heat to release some steam.
Blend the soup in batches. It’s probably best to divide this in half and blend it 1/2 the batch at a time. By doing this you’re leaving room in the blender for the soup to move around.
Remove the center cover from the blender and cover with a towel instead. Most blender tops have a removable plastic piece in the center. Take this center piece out and put a clean dish towel over the opening while blending. (You don’t want soup on the ceiling!). Doing this allows the steam to vent out and prevents pressure from building up in the blender. Make sure to hold your hand over the dish towel to avoid it from moving/splattering.
Healthy Potato Soup
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 cup diced onions
- 1 cup diced carrots
- ½ cup diced celery
- 4 cups cubed potatoes peeled and chopped into 1 inch pieces (about 1 lb or 5-6 medium sized potatoes)
- 4 cups vegetable broth low or no sodium
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon fresh rosemary chopped finely
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
- 2 cups milk dairy free if necessary, room temperature
Instructions
Stove Top Directions:
- In a large pot, heat olive oil. Add onions, carrots and celery to the pot. Sauté for 5 minutes.
- Add potatoes, broth, garlic powder, rosemary, salt and pepper. Do not add milk.
- Cover the pot and bring the soup to a boil. Once boiling, reduce to a simmer for 30 minutes, or until your potatoes are fork tender. Make sure to stir the soup every few minutes.
- Once the soup has finished cooking, stir in milk. Make sure the milk is room temperature so it doesn't curdle. You can microwave it for a few seconds if it is cold.
- Use an immersion blender or regular blender to blend the soup.
- Serve with your favorite toppings like bacon, chives or cheese.
Instant Pot Directions:
- Set the Instant Pot to sauté mode for 15 minutes. Heat olive oil. While oil is heating, chop veggies.
- Sauté onions, carrots, and celery until onions are translucent. Turn off sauté mode. Make sure to scrape off any pieces of food on the bottom of the Instant Pot or you will get a burn notice during cooking.
- Pour in remaining ingredients, except milk.
- Set the Instant Pot to sealing, pressure cook for 10 minutes on high pressure. It will take about 10 minutes for the pot to come to pressure before it starts to count down.
- Manually release pressure when timer goes off.
- Once the soup has finished cooking, stir in milk. Make sure the milk is room temperature so it doesn't curdle. You can microwave it for a few seconds if it is cold.
- Use an immersion blender or regular blender to blend the soup.
Crockpot Directions:
- In a sauté pan, heat olive oil. While oil is heating, chop veggies.
- Sauté onions, carrots, and celery until onions are translucent, about 10 minutes. (This step is optional, but adds flavor)
- Add all ingredients into the crockpot, except milk.
- Set the crockpot to cook for 6 hours on high, or 8 hours on low.
- Once the soup has finished cooking, stir in milk. Make sure the milk is room temperature so it doesn't curdle. You can microwave it for a few seconds if it is cold.
- Use an immersion blender or regular blender to blend the soup.
Loved it
I made this tonight. The only two things I did different was use plain hashbrowns because I didn’t want to peel and chop potatoes – made a huge pot, 10+ servings. I also used less milk. Love it and it will be on rotation.
My friends favorite soup is potato soup and I made this for her and she said she loved it!!
I used low sodium chicken broth and whole milk and I added about a 2.5 ounces of cheddar to the recipe before I served it to her and my family with crumbled bacon and more freshly graded cheddar cheese on top and everyone enjoyed it!
Love this soup! I’ve made this potato soup on repeat. Very tasty and easy recipe to follow. So good!
Loved this recipe 🙂 My friends loved this as well. 🥰
So happy to hear that, Kim!
I made this today. Just a couple of changes.. Added a handful of shredded cabbage and some chopped cauliflower to the mix. I didn’t have vegetable broth, so used chicken. It was good and a welcome warm-up on a cold day.
Sounds delicious – thanks for trying it!
This looks amazing – do you know if you can freeze the soup to reheat later?
There’s a storage section in each post, look for hte snowflake icon 🙂 Yes it can! Store your potato soup in an airtight containers.
When you’re ready to eat, defrost the night before by leaving this in the fridge, or take out of the refrigerator and heat over the stove/in the microwave.
This soup is easy to make and tastes great! I love it!
So happy you liked it, Sarah! Thank you!
I used Land of Lakes lactose free half and half for my milk. Otherwise, I followed the recipe as is. It is delicious and would be a nice base for clam chowder.
I’m so glad you liked it, Connie! If you’re looking for a chowder, check out this Chicken Corn Chowder
Made this for company at my house and everyone loved it!!
Do you have planned meals for old people /2 people
I’m 86 heart / but doing well
My wife is 85 d A-Fib & Dealing W/Dementia & not bed ridden
I would like a healthy plan for us
Check out these easy healthy one pot meals. They are not designed for 2 people, but most have 4 servings and reheat great for leftovers the next day. Hope this helps!
We are on a healthier track and this one is a staple. It is easy and delicious. I use no salt added broth and 2% milk. Definitely worth making. I do it on the stovetop and use a blender. I like that there are directions for different methods. A certified hit at my house.