Creamy Carrot Soup has surprisingly simple ingredients like carrots, onion, celery, and bacon, but it tastes gourmet. Just like our popular Potato Soup, this is a quick and easy recipe that comes together in one pot. You will love the silky smooth texture and rich flavor.
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Why You’ll Love This Carrot Soup Recipe
Carrot soup is loaded with sweet carrots, plenty of onion and celery (don’t worry – they disappear into the final soup but add amazing flavor), fresh garlic, bacon, and light cream. Sauteeing the bacon first and cooking the rest of the soup in a little bit of bacon grease elevates the flavor of this cream of carrot soup.
It’s such a comforting and flavorful bowl of soup. All you need to go with it are some Dinner Rolls or crusty French Bread.
How to Make Easy Carrot Soup
You’ll love how this soup comes together in one pot. If you use an immersion blender, it’s even easier since you can blend it right in the pot and don’t have to transfer it to the blender. Immersion blenders are amazing!
In a large pot or 5 1/2 Qt Dutch oven, brown the bacon over medium heat and transfer to a plate, keeping the bacon grease in the pot.
Add diced onion, celery, and sliced carrots and cook 6-8 min. Add minced garlic, salt, and black pepper and cook another minute.
Add chicken broth, and simmer partially covered 20-25 min until carrots are soft.
Return soup to the pot, stir in 1/2 cup cream, 1/2 cup milk, salt and pepper to taste, then bring to a simmer and remove from heat.
Ways to Blend Creamy Soups
There are many ways to blend soup, but not all are effective in getting a restaurant-quality ultra-smooth consistency.
High-Powered Blender: Transfer your soup to your blender in batches. You should never fill a blender more than halfway with hot liquids to avoid burns, spills or ‘explosions.’ A high-powered blender will do the job best. Our blender has openings in the lid to allow heat to escape so you don’t end up with a vacuum.
Immersion Blender:You can blend the soup to the right consistency and save yourself some dishes by using an immersion blender. Blend directly in your soup pot. It has a shield around the blade to avoid scratching your pot. Wear an oven mitt and apron while using in case there is any splatter.
An Electric Hand Mixer – This is not as good as an immersion blender for getting a silky smooth texture. An electric hand mixer can also scratch up your coated pots.
A Food Processor is our least favorite option as it doesn’t achieve the smoothness that you get from a high-powered standing blender or immersion blender. It is better for processing thicker and chunkier sauces and soups.
I fell in love with creamy soups on our honeymoon in Mexico where we dined in 5-star restaurants and soup was often served as a starter. They were so simple and so elegant at the same time. Here are some tips to make silky smooth blended soups:
Don’t overcook or undercook the vegetables. Cook until uniformly soft without resistance to the bite.
Season to taste at the end. You won’t be able to truly gauge the flavor until the end after it’s all blended.
Add cream last. You don’t want to keep boiling after the cream is added.
Don’t forget toppings! They aren’t just for looks. Toppings like bacon, parsley, black pepper or an extra swirl of cream will add just the right amount of texture and flavor and keep your soup exciting for adults. Remember it’s not baby food!
Can I Make This a Dairy-Free Carrot Soup?
Yes! You can skip the cream and milk and use coconut milk instead for a carrot coconut soup, just like we did in our Sweet Potato Soup. It will still have amazing flavor and be a dairy-free creamy soup.
This Carrot soup is a feel-good comfort food and will warm your belly. If you love quick and cozy soup recipes, don’t miss our most popular Zuppa Toscana, classic Chicken Noodle Soup, and loaded Taco Soup (to change up your Taco Tuesday routine). These are just a few of our best soup recipes.
More Creamy Soup Recipes
Roasted Butternut Squash Soup
Clam Chowder
Corn Chowder
Creamy Cauliflower Soup
Easy Tomato Soup
Chicken and Wild Rice Soup
Creamy Carrot Soup
4.96 from 124 votes
Author: Natasha Kravchuk
Creamy Carrot Soup has surprisingly simple ingredients but tastes gourmet. This is a 30-minute recipe that comes together in one pot. You will love the silky smooth texture and rich flavor.
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Prep Time: 15 minutesmins
Cook Time: 30 minutesmins
Total Time: 45 minutesmins
Ingredients
Servings: 8people (1 cup servings)
6ozbacon, 6 strips, chopped
1large yellow onion, diced (2 cups)
1celery rib, diced (1/2 cup)
2lbscarrots, 8 large, peeled and sliced into 1/2” thick rings
Brown bacon in a 5 1/2 qt Dutch oven or large pot over medium heat and remove browned bacon with a slotted spoon.
Into the same pot with the rendered bacon fat, add diced onion, celery, and sliced carrots and cook 6-8 minutes until onions soften (do not brown). Add minced garlic and 2 tsp salt and 1/8 tsp black pepper, and stir another minute.
Add 4 cups chicken stock, bring to a simmer then partially cover and cook 20-25 minutes or until carrots have softened.
Welcome to my kitchen! I am Natasha, the blogger behind Natasha's Kitchen (since 2009). My husband and I run this blog together and share only our best, family approved and tested recipes with YOU. Thanks for stopping by! We are so happy you're here.
Possibilities include cream, coconut milk, yogurt, or even pureed avocado. If you choose coconut milk, be aware that it will impart a sweet, coconut flavor, which might not be right for every soup. Yogurt will add tanginess.
It may sound a bit strange and unusual for some, but vinegar is a common ingredient in some soup recipes, and there is a good reason for it. If you think about it, vinegar is really a flavor-enhancer (umami). That's why it is so often used in cooking, sauces, and salad dressings. The same is true with soups.
If a soup is tasting bland in the bowl, consider adding acid rather than salt. A squeeze of lemon or lime, or a dash of yogurt or sour cream can add brightness to the bowl. Start with the basics. Ensure you've added enough salt and black pepper.
Heat the oil in a large pan, add the onions, carrots and garlic, sauté for 4 mins, until they are beginning to soften but not colour. Stir in the ground coriander and plenty of seasoning and cook for 1 min. Add the stock and bring to the boil, cover and simmer for 20 mins or until the carrots are really tender.
A common mistake is to not run the blender long enough. This results in a grainy-textured soup. The soup should be blended long enough to create a silky-smooth texture. Once the soup has been fully blended, it can also be strained through a fine mesh strainer to ensure any skins or tough fibers are removed.
How do you balance sweetness in Carrot Soup? If this carrot soup is a bit too sweet for your taste, you can balance out that sweetness with 1 teaspoon of apple cider vinegar or lemon juice to boost and brighten the flavor.
About this method: One of the most common ways to thicken sauces and soups is with a starch-based slurry, and cornstarch is a popular choice. Cornstarch is flavorless, easy to mix up, and versatile, which makes it a go-to pantry ingredient.
For clear, brothy soups, stock is your most important ingredient. If you want to make a good soup, you need to use an excellently flavored stock — otherwise, the entire pot could be tasteless.
Foods that have a great deal of acidity, like lemon juice, vinegar, white wine, and tomato puree, can help liven up the flavor of bland-tasting bone and other broths. "The acidity of these ingredients works to complement and enhance the broth's flavors, not mask it.
Is your homemade soup missing something? Add a splash or two of ACV when the soup is done cooking. The vinegar helps lift and highlight flavors. Pickle with ACV.
Corn-starch slurry is an easy way to thicken soups and sauces quickly. Mix equal parts corn starch and cold water (1 tablespoon is a good starting point) in a bowl until all the corn starch is dissolved and the resultant liquid is consistent. Then pour slowly in soup while storing continuously.
Add the carrots in the last half hour or so or when the beans are close to tender. That way the carrots will come out cooked but not mushy. Ditto, for other veggies… add them according to how much time they need to cook.
Seasoning carrots is a great way to help bring out their flavor. For a simple and versatile seasoning, stick with salt, pepper, and garlic. For an herbier taste, add rosemary, parsley, cumin, or coriander. Or, to bring out their fresh, woody flavor, add some anise.
While certain vegetables can work just fine added directly to simmering soups and stews (say, carrots and celery), other vegetables (onions, garlic, and the like) will almost always need at least a brief sweat in a fat-based liquid before adding the remaining ingredients.
"The majority of issues with a creamy soup come from undercooking the vegetables," explains Rick Martinez, associate food editor at BA. They should be uniformly soft, with no resistance or "bite"—otherwise, they will not stand up to the blender. You'll be left with a soup that's watery in portions and lumpy in others.
Failing to add an acidic component is perhaps the most common mistake everyone makes with homemade soup. To balance flavor and mouthfeel, each dish you create should have elements of fat, acid, sweetness, and salt. Often the fat comes from butter, oil, meat, or dairy.
“When the vegetable is cut, its cells rupture and release sugars and volatile hydrocarbons, the sources of the vegetables' sweetness and aroma,” he writes. "The more cells you rupture, the better the taste.”
i used about 5 carrots, a tiny bit of celery (about a finger's length?), about a thumbnail sized bit of ginger and some home made stock (the stock tastes fine) pinch of sugar, a teaspoon of cumin and some salt and pepper. I was able to save it by putting some chilli in it which covered the bitterness.
Yes, you can definitely add cream to your soup. Whether you use a few tablespoons or a few cups, cream gives soup a silky mouthfeel and rich flavor. You can definitely add milk or other dairy as well, though it will taste gradually less creamy as you go down in percent.
Yogurt, Sour Cream, and Crème Fraîche – Dairy like yogurt, sour cream, and crème fraîche can add a creamy acidity to soups, but can curdle and be unpleasant if cooked over heat for too long, so swirl these in last.
Dairy is used to create a creamy, silky, decadent texture in soup. But it's also used as a thickening agent. So the right substitution will depend on your ultimate goal – creamy versus thickening.
Introduction: My name is Merrill Bechtelar CPA, I am a clean, agreeable, glorious, magnificent, witty, enchanting, comfortable person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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