The Ultimate Creamy Potato Soup
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An easy and delicious creamy potato soup recipe that can be made in just one pot! Loaded with bacon and creamy potato goodness, this is a favorite comfort food in my household.
Something savory today!
Savory, creamy, and loaded with bacon, sour cream, and cheese. You guys already know that we don’t exactly do health food around here, right? 😉
Even when I’m not sharing desserts, the food is always comfort food, and that’s usually best served with extra cheese (have you tried my baked mac and cheese yet!?) and usually comes with a few calories. Let’s not think about that too much, alright?
I know I mentioned to you guys that I had this potato soup recipe for you back when I posted my Oreo Balls; I made it when Zach had a bad cold and I haven’t stopped thinking about it since (you might think that’s an exaggeration, but I can assure you that my food obsessions run deep… Please see photo below to understand why).
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Zach prefers to eat healthy most of the time (I pretend that I do, too, but really if I lived alone I’m pretty sure I’d eat creamy cheesy foods every night and never fit through any doors ever again), so the soup was a good break from baked chicken breast, but this definitely isn’t an every night kind of meal in our house.
Potato soup is definitely on the menu for this weekend, though… it’s so frigid outside I’ve convinced myself that I need soup, specifically creamy potato soup, to survive. Potato soup makes me dramatic, evidently.
If you’re in the midst of a cold spell yourself (or even if you’re not) I think you’re going to enjoy this creamy potato soup as much as we do. Read on for some tips on how to make it!
Tips for Perfect Creamy Potato Soup
- Cut your potatoes into pieces no larger than 3/4″ and try to keep them around the same size so that they cook at the same time. Nothing worse than biting into a crisp, raw-inside chunk of potato!
- To make this soup nice and creamy, I recommend pureeing about half of it either by using an immersion blender or by transferring a portion of the soup to a blender, pureeing, and then stirring the pureed soup back into the pot (maybe you recognize this technique from my corn chowder). If you want a completely smooth soup you can puree all of it, but I prefer to have a few actual pieces of potato, so I think pureeing half gives it the best taste and texture.
- Don’t return the bacon to the pot until after you have pureed some of the soup. It’s best not to blend the bacon 😉.
- The ancho chili powder is, in my humble opinion, a must and gives this soup the most perfect depth of flavor. I blend it into the potato soup and also sprinkle it on top before serving. I recommend adding just a 1/4 teaspoon and then taste testing before adding more.
This would make a great comfort food for this cold and windy weekend (is there anything more cozy than a pot of soup simmering on the stove while the wind is howling at your window? Anything!?), and while I don’t follow football at all I do know that this would be great to make ahead and enjoy during the big game this weekend.
Who really cares about football when you can make yourself a Super Bowl of soup! 🤣😂 OK OK I’m sorry, enough of that!
Enjoy!
How to Make Potato Soup
The Ultimate Potato Soup Recipe
Equipment
Ingredients
- 6 strips (uncooked) bacon, cut into small pieces
- 3 Tablespoons butter, unsalted or salted will work
- 1 medium yellow onion, chopped (about 1.5 cup/200g)
- 3 large garlic cloves, minced
- ⅓ cup all-purpose flour, (42g)
- 2 ½ lbs gold potatoes, peeled and diced into pieces no larger than 1” (this was about 6 Large potatoes for me/1.15kg)
- 4 cups chicken broth, (945ml)
- 2 cups milk, (475ml)
- ⅔ cup heavy cream, (155ml)
- 1 ½ teaspoon* salt
- 1 teaspoon ground pepper
- ¼ - ½ teaspoon ancho chili powder**
- ⅔ cup sour cream, (160g)
- Shredded cheddar cheese, chives, and additional sour cream and bacon for topping, optional
Instructions
- Place bacon pieces in a large Dutch Oven or soup pot over medium heat and cook until bacon is crisp and browned.
- Remove bacon pieces and set aside, leaving the fat in the pot.
- Add butter and chopped onion and cook over medium heat until onions are tender (3-5 minutes).
- Add garlic and cook until fragrant (about 30 seconds).
- Sprinkle the flour over the ingredients in the pot and stir until smooth (use whisk if needed).
- Add diced potatoes to the pot along with chicken broth, milk, heavy cream, salt, pepper, and ancho chili powder. Stir well.
- Bring to a boil and cook until potatoes are tender when pierced with a fork (about 10 minutes).
- Reduce heat to simmer and remove approximately half*** of the soup to a blender (be careful, it will be hot!) and puree until smooth (half is about 5 cups of soup, but just eyeballing the amount will be fine. Alternatively you can use an immersion blender.).
- Return the pureed soup to the pot and add sour cream and reserved bacon pieces, stir well.
- Allow soup to simmer for 15 minutes before serving.
- Top with additional sour cream, bacon, cheddar cheese, or chives. Enjoy!
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Like this? Leave a comment below!
I’m not a soup person, but this is hands down THE BEST I’ve EVER had (better than Minestrone soup 😬; sorry, someone had to say it). So much so that my picky eater had a 2nd helping!!! 😳 It takes a little bit of work, but so worth it. Also, I mixed the seasoning in full as written in a separate condiment bowl and only ended up using about half of the mixture as it was more than enough. An absolute MUST to try! 😊
Is it possible to do this soup with out preening any of it?
Hi Melissa! You don’t have to puree it, but your soup will be much thinner and your texture won’t be quite what it should be.
I made this soup tonight for My daughter and her boyfriend and myself. It turned out really good.
Absolutely the VERY BEST potato soup I have EVER had!!!!!
where does the flour come into play? how much do i use? it’s mentioned in the instructions but not ingredients?
It’s in the ingredients between the garlic and potatoes. 🙂
This was absolutely the BEST potato soup I’ve ever had or made. I actually used 3lbs of yukon gold potatoes since my bag was a 3lb bag. Also, used half and half since I used all my heavy cream in another recipe. And decided to use a cup of sour cream. It was so good I forgot to put cheese, chives and sour cream on top. I did use my bacon. It was yummy. I will keep this recipe to use all the time. Thank you for such a great potato soup recipe!
I recently went to a wine dinner and they served potato bacon soup. It was soo good I searched for a similar recipe to try to make it. This was it!!! I will be making this all winter. So delicious!
made this tonight. the only thing I did differently was add a little white pepper when adding the potatoes and some fresh shredded sharp cheddar with the bacon and sour cream
I made this tonight, so cold in NY. It was simply perfect! So much for my New Year’s resolution to lose weight, but worth it!
Made this last night and LOVED it. Thank you for sharing it!
Delicious Very easy to make this is my favorite recipe for potato soup
Thank you for recipe
This was delicious! Thanks for a great recipe. I normally use russets for potato soup but the golds worked really well.
We’re so happy you enjoyed it, Katie! Thanks for the review ❤️
Just made this today, followed your recipe closely. It was fabulous! Loved every bite! My husband used the cooking spoon and cleaned the pot out. He loved it also and said many times how good it was. We will have the rest for our supper tonight. Will certainly make this again.
We’re so happy the soup was such a hit, Pam! Enjoy your dinner 😋
This was absolutely delicious! I’m putting it in my permanent recipe folder. Maybe next time I’ll add some cauliflower for a bit more nutrition.
We’re so happy you enjoyed it, Tasha! We love the idea of adding cauliflower 🥰
Easy, had all ingredients without shopping, delicious & hearty!
Thanks so much for the review, Jolene! Enjoy ☺️
So delicious!!! I used lactose free sour cream, dairy alternative heavy cream, and whole milk. This is just what I had in the fridge 😅 1/4tsp of cayenne pepper powder (I didn’t have ancho chili powder). I also used the full 1tsp of pepper and that was my only regret it’s too peppery for me, but still delicious, I would make it again and reduce this to 1/2tsp. Thanks for recipe!!!
Thanks for letting us know how it went for you, Romi! We’re glad you enjoyed it 🥰
Can I use cream cheese instead of sour cream?
Hi Nicki! A few other people have commented that they have done this with success 😊