Winter Vegetable Soup

Warm, thick, creamy winter vegetable soup that is chock full of winter veggies and not a drop of cream! The perfect cold weather healthy comfort food.

Here we are again, smack in the middle of winter and yes, even though my friends and family up North have already shoveled tons of snow and I have yet to see one snowflake, it’s still in the thirties down here in the Carolinas.  

So you know what we need?  Besides crackling fires and lots of blankets and dogs that curl up obligingly on our toes?

 We need SOUP.  Warm, wonderful, thick, creamy good and good for you soup.  And lots of it.  

And since it is January and I am still in the midst of being pretty good about my post-holiday light eating, I need all that warm thick creaminess to come without any, well, cream.  Which is how this winter vegetable soup was born!

And speaking of coziness, I have been meaning and meaning and meaning to show you the most beautiful thing we got a while back.

The Southern husband and I have been collecting antique quilts forever, and back in our old New Jersey house we had them hanging on the walls, because they truly ARE artwork.

When we moved down here, the design of our Carolina house didn’t have the same wall space, and I was sadly thinking that our sweet quilts would have to live in a closet somewhere…until our friends at Southern Studio suggested that we put them on a blanket ladder.

I searched high and low for a blanket ladder that could handle all of them, and finally I found the great folks at IJKD Decor and Wood Shop on Etsy, who made us this!

A perfect, extra large ladder so that we can see our sweet cozy quilts every day.

Which just goes to show you that there is a solution to most things if you are creative enough – including making a soup with no cream taste delectably creamy!

Here’s how you make creamy, dreamy winter vegetable soup!

You need some carrots…

…and some leeks…

…and some celery, and some potatoes.

Chop them all up and sauté it all up in a little butter, then simmer them in chicken broth until everything is nice and tender.  

Break out your blender and give the whole thing a whirl until your soup is nice and smooth (and if you have an immersion blender you can do this right in the pot!), and then season it up to your liking with salt and pepper.

Now, you could ladle up exactly as is, but I like to make a quick little sour cream and horseradish drizzle to go on top, and then I give the whole thing a generous grinding of black pepper just for good measure.  

Just because we are being all New Year New You doesn’t mean we aren’t entitled to a little zing.

Happy healthy warm and cozy New Year!

Print