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!
Very creamy
this is the best potato soup I have ever eaten. I will make this again. everyone loved it
So many great recipes on her website! This is delicious too! Ditched my old recipe and have used this for over a year. Have made it without sour cream and bacon when I didn’t have it on hand and it’s still amazing. Have two vegan/gluten free family members and this recipe also adapts well for them. Replaced butter, flour, and milk with olive oil, gf flour, and unsweetened oat (or almond) milk. FIVE stars!
Delicious! The effort-to-reward ratio is amazing on this soup. Comfort food at its finest!
I’m so happy to hear you enjoyed, Lindsay! Thank you so much for trying my recipe, I hope you find more recipes on my website that you love just as much!
I have never commented on a recipe in my 35 years…but I had to for this one!
My (somewhat picky) kids couldn’t stop raving about this, and I felt the same. This was the best potato soup I’ve ever had!! To my fellow lactose intolerants – take a Lactaid or just brave it, but you’ll be missing out if you don’t try this 😛
Perfect way to indulge during these cold nights
I have always wanted to make potato pup and your recipe was phenomenal! So full of flavor! Does the soup freeze well? I should have halved the recipe for just 2 of us. Thank you for sharing!!
I normally don’t leave comments but this soup is tottally worthy of making again. I LOVE it and wish I would have seen this recipe sooner. I used leftover cooked bacon that I in the freezer and added a tbs of bacon grease as well. I love using leftovers that are in my freezer.
I didn’t thicken it using your puree method because I used extra potatoes into the recipe and it thickened perfectly. I also used whole milk and half & half cause I rarely buy heavy creme. I also substituted your spice and used.paprika instead.
super delicious.
superb
comment is based on using less bacon (all i had), leeks, diced carrots and celery, and seasoning with rosemary, marjoram and tarragon, as I wanted a more French flavor profile.
My whole family loves this soup! I’ve made it twice so far, this time I doubled the recipe. Both times I omit the ancho chili and add old bay and paprika and it is SO GOOD.
Can this recipe be made with hashbrowns??
Hi Ella! I haven’t personally tried it, but I have had other commenters report using hash browns with success. I’m not sure if any alterations are needed.
Add celery – lower butter and bacon to make healthier
this will be my 2nd time making this delishish potatoe soup, I just hop it turns out as good as the 1st. so yummy 😋 ty4 sharing
This is a keeper!! Cold night or not! FYI, I cooked the whole potatoes in my instant pot, cooled them down and just scraped the peelings off.