Name: Hearty Vegetable Soup
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 55 min
Total time: 1 h 5 min
Yield: 4
Cuisine: British
Ingredients: 1 onion, chopped finely; 2 cloves of garlic, crushed; 1 large leek, sliced finely; 2 sticks of celery, chopped; 2 carrots, chopped; 250g of potato, peeled and chopped into small cubes (use a waxy variety); 1 litre of chicken or vegetable stock; 2 bay leaves; a couple of sprigs of fresh thyme (or 1 teaspoon of dried); optional: a pinch of chilli flakes; salt and pepper to season; fresh chopped parsley; cooking oil spray (I used avocado spray oil)

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Hearty Vegetable Soup with a delicious combination of flavours from golden potatoes, leeks, and other vegetables.

hearty vegetable soup in pan with wooden spoon

Healthy Filling Vegetable Soup

Soon as the colder months set in, filling soups like this Hearty Vegetable Soup is a regular on my menu. It's a great way to get lots of good vegetables into a meal and is a dish that the kids will definitely enjoy too.

They can be funny ones at times, not so keen on plain veggies on their plate, but add them to something like soup and they will devour the lot with no complaints.

The combination of different vegetables, potato and herbs mean this is packed with yummy flavour too.

close up of hearty vegetable soup in pan with wooden spoon

Sautéing the Vegetables for Soup

It's an important process of making soup to really enhance the flavour, otherwise, your soup can end up pretty bland and tasteless.

Usually, heaps of olive oil or similar would be used for this process, but to keep points down we use spray oil and then the clever trick of using a little bit of stock and reducing it down around the vegetables until they are softened and you get that naturally sweetened flavour of the vegetables.

You don't want those vegetables to burn as that will make the soup bitter. It's a process that needs patience and trust me the flavour will be immense.

Types of Vegetables in Hearty Vegetable Soup

In this soup, we use onion, garlic, celery, leeks and carrots along with potato. The type of potato really matters. Don't use floury varieties, as otherwise, they will disintegrate into the soup. Instead, you want a waxy variety of potatoes. My absolute favourite type is Yukon Golds, they have a lovely yellowy colour and an almost buttery flavour.

In the UK - Elfe potatoes are similar to Yukon Golds, but use a variety of waxy potato you can find.

If you are on a Slimming Eats SP day or want to make this zero WW Flex/Freestyle Smart Points, then you can swap out the potato for butternut squash. It will give the soup a sweeter flavour, but it's still really filling and delicious.

hearty vegetable soup in soup cup with spoon

Sides for Hearty Vegetable Soup

You love something to dunk in your soup, but don't have a Healthy Extra B spare for some bread, what do you do?

If you don't want to use some bread, then all these are great sides to serve alongside this:

CHEDDAR BUTTER BEAN BITES
BROCCOLI CHEDDAR HASH BROWN MUFFINS
SWEET POTATO HASH BROWNS
CRISPY GOLDEN HASH BROWNS
CHEESY SWEET POTATO AND ZUCCHINI BITES
OVEN BAKED FALAFEL
PORK SAUSAGE BREAKFAST PATTIES
CHEESY COUSCOUS BITES WITH TOMATO DIP

or another great option is to top with some cooked protein, like fish, leftover chicken, chunks of ham or even top with some cooked chickpeas (for this I just sauteed some drained canned chickpeas in a frying pan with a little sea salt and paprika and spray oil until warmed)

close up of hearty vegetable soup in soup cup

This recipe was originally created on 28 November 2010 and updated on the 26 November 2019

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Recipe Card

Hearty Vegetable Soup

Yield: SERVES 4

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Cook Time: 55 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour 5 minutes

Hearty Vegetable Soup with a delicious combination of flavours from golden potatoes, leeks, and other vegetables.

Ingredients

1 onion, chopped finely
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 large leek, sliced finely
2 sticks of celery, chopped
2 carrots, chopped
250g of potato, peeled and chopped into small cubes (use a waxy variety)
1 litre of chicken or vegetable stock
2 bay leaves
a couple of sprigs of fresh thyme (or 1 teaspoon of dried)
optional: a pinch of chilli flakes
salt and pepper to season
fresh chopped parsley
cooking oil spray (I used avocado spray oil)

Instructions

Spray a large saucepan over medium heat with some cooking oil spray and add the onions, garlic and celery.
Fry for a couple of minutes to soften. Add in a little stock at a time and reduce down to prevent any burning/sticking
Add in the leeks and carrot and spray again with the cooking oil spray and fry for a couple more minutes until the leeks have cooked down a little. Again added a little bit of the stock to prevent any burning/sticking
Stir in the thyme, Bay leaves (plus chilli flakes if using).
Add the potatoes and stock then bring to a boil.
Reduce heat and cover and simmer for approx 45 minutes.
Roughly blend some of the soup with a hand blender or you can add half of the soup to a traditional blender. I like to keep some chunks of vegetables in my soup but you can blend it all if you like a smooth soup.
Taste and season with salt and pepper as needed.
Sprinkle with fresh parsley.
Enjoy!!

Notes

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Calories - scroll down to nutritional info box
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