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I can’t wait to share my favorite vegan potato soup recipe. It’s creamy, loaded with robust flavor and oh so comforting. No dairy, no problem.
This Autumn I’m sharing my family’s fav vegan potato soup recipe. It’s super creamy and actually filling. Potato soup is the ultimate comfort food in cooler weather and this gluten-free potato soup is no exception.
Table of Contents
Originally featured in my Autumn Cleanse Guide, this recipe is loved by the Simple Green Smoothies community and will quickly become a staple on your menu as well.
Vegan Potato Soup Ingredients
Here are the superstar ingredients that make this potato soup a cut above the rest:
- Coconut oil: This is my go-to healthy fat for cooking.
- Leeks: A gorgeous vegetable with a mild-onion flavor.
- Golden potatoes: Golden potatoes are the creamiest of the bunch. You can also use them in my Vegetarian Shepherd’s Pie if you have extras.
- Garlic: Use real, whole garlic for the best flavor and nutritional benefits.
- Vegetable Stock: Do you know how easy it is to make your own stock?
- Cauliflower: A not-so-sneaky way to add creaminess and more veggies to my soup.
- Nutritional Yeast: A cheesy flavor without the dairy!
- Kale: Used in crunchy kale croutons to perfectly finish off this dinner.
That’s it! I know soups are known to have lengthy ingredient lists, but not this one! I keep it short, sweet and delicious.
Pro Tip: Depending on the type of vegetable stock you use, your final soup may be more yellow (I’m talking cheddar cheese!) or potato-white. Either is fine. It just depends on what’s in that stock.
Gluten-Free Potato Soup Ingredient Swaps
Soup is a wonderful meal idea since you can swap in/out ingredients for what you have on hand. If leeks are hard to find, use a yellow onion instead. While golden potatoes are usually on-hand at my house, use whatever potatoes you want. Cauliflower can be swapped with broccoli (just don’t be alarmed by the color change).
While I love the creaminess this vegan potato soup brings, sometimes I like to switch it up and leave a few potato chunks in the final product. Or add some chopped carrots for something to chew on.
How to Make Delicious Potato Soup
For a successful potato soup, you’ll need a large pot as well as a heat-safe blender (or immersion blender). I love using a ceramic Dutch Oven to sauté the veggies before simmering them into a soup.
Step 1: Start by heating the coconut oil or cooking oil of your choice in the large soup pot. Add the chopped leek and a pinch of salt to sauté.
Step 2: After the leek softens, add the minced garlic and sauté, stirring constantly. Garlic burns easily, so make sure you continue to stir the garlic while it browns to avoid burning.
Step 3: Since the cauliflower and potatoes will take about the same time to cook, add them both in next along with the vegetable stock. Once the pot is simmering, turn the heat down to keep it on a low simmer until everything is fork-tender. Adding a lid at this stage helps the vegetables soften faster as well as keep the flavors locked in.
Step 4: Remove the soup pot from the stove and on to the fun part! Check that your blender container can handle hot items (my old Vitamix couldn’t but my new one can), or decide if you want to use an immersion blender. The soup will be hot, so be careful. You may need to add a bit more vegetable stock at this step to help the soup blend nicely and still keep a soup-like consistency.
If I want some potato or cauliflower chunks in my soup, I’ll save a few and add them into the pot after I blend. Then I return the pot to the heat and cook for about ten minutes to soften the veggies. Now on to the best part… the kale croutons!
Crunchy Croutons
You can enjoy your beautifully fragrant potato soup at this point, but I strongly suggest giving these simple kale croutons a try. They are that good.
Step 1: While your soup is simmering, tear the kale into large pieces after removing the stems.
Step 2: Mix with melted coconut oil, Dijon mustard and sea salt until all the leaves are well coated. This gets a bit messy but is worth it.
Step 3: Bake at 300°F for 20-25 minutes, or until the kale is crispy. My croutons often firm up a bit more after removing from the oven if I keep them on the baking tray for a few minutes. This way I don’t over-cook them.
Topping this gluten-free potato soup with kale croutons keeps out the often inflammatory gluten but also provides quite a lovely burst of flavor.
Vegan Potato Soup FAQs
My vegan potato soup uses cauliflower to make it cream up during blending without needing any dairy.
No need! They will cook down nicely in the simmering stock mixture, so pre-soaking is an unnecessary step.
I use golden potatoes since they are the creamiest variety in my opinion, as well as cauliflower that creams up nicely when blended. Cauliflower adds another vegetable to your soup without adding any overpowering flavors.
More Autumn Soup Recipes
I love fresh Autumn produce, and what better way to use them than in warm soups? Here are a few of my go-to recipes this season:
- Tortilla Soup: This surprising soup is fun to make and enjoy with the toppings of your choice.
- Vegetable Noodle Soup: My take on a plant-based chicken noodle soup. All the flavor without the meat.
- Creamy Tomato Soup: The perfect soup for kids and adults alike, loaded with veggies.
- Carrot Ginger Soup: Probably my favorite lunch soup!
Don’t forget to rate + review this recipe once you’ve made it!
Vegan Potato Soup
Ingredients
For Vegan Potato Soup:
- 2 tbsps coconut oil
- 2 leeks white part thinly sliced
- 4 gold potatoes chopped
- 4 garlic cloves minced
- 4 cups vegetable stock
- 1 ½ cups cauliflower chopped
- dash sea salt
- dash ground black pepper
- dash nutritional yeast
For Kale Croutons:
- 2 cups kale tough stems removed
- 1 tbsp coconut oil
- 1 tsp Dijon mustard
- ¼ tsp sea salt
Instructions
- Heat coconut oil in a large pot, Add the leek and a pinch of salt.
- Once the leeks start to soften, add the garlic and sauté for 1 minute.
- Add the vegetable stock, potatoes and cauliflower and bring to a simmer.
- Cook until cauliflower and potatoes are tender. While the soup is cooking, prepare the Kale Croutons.
- Remove soup from heat and puree using an immersion blender or standard blender (Use caution when blending-soup will be hot!). If soup is a little too thick, add a little more vegetable stock.
- Ladle into bowls and top with Kale Croutons. Season with salt, pepper and nutritional yeast.
For Kale Croutons:
- Tear kale into large pieces.
- Mix with remaining ingredients.
- Bake at 300°F for 20-25 minutes or until kale is crispy.
Equipment
- dutch oven
- heat-safe blender
Notes
- To keep sodium levels lower, use low-sodium vegetable stock (or make your own!).
- Swap leek with 1 yellow onion.
- To create a chunkier soup, dice 1 extra potato and 2 carrots. Add to the large pot after blending and simmer the soup for 10 more minutes, or until vegetables are tender to your liking.
This was great. I served my first bowl to my “gluten-free” husband and he was amazed at the flavor. I used my immersion blender for the first bowl. However, I wanted more so I used my Vitamix to make a creamy version. As I was putting it away for lunch tomorrow, I took a little bowl and added some butter and it was the best creamy mashed potatoes I have ever had. I love texture foods, so the added Kale leaves roasted were perfect. For my lunch, I kept the nutritional yeast and kale in their own container so I can have a little crunch then too. As a Midwesterner- we love our potatoes- this will be a weekly this fall/ winter. Plus it was so simple. Thank you.
This soup is delicious, simple, and only takes one pot! I did run it through my regular blender so I guess I had to clean that too, but this is a perfect immersion blender recipe if you want some tiny chucks left over. I did add a bit of ground rosemary and thyme, because I love them with potato anything!
I was also pleasantly surprised with the kale ‘croutons’, which I made using a baby kale and spinach blend since I had it on hand and needed to use it up. I imagine they’d be even better with curly kale!
Looking forward to trying this yummie recipe!
Looks good. Will try it today
This soup is delicious! I love all the healthy ingredients and how quickly it came together.
The Comfort potato soup was a big hit for our family: Great taste, not difficult to make! Next time, I may use a little less garlic, otherwise, very tasty!
Wow! Awesome flavor!
Simple and easy to make. I’ve been WFPB for over 3 years and am always looking for new recipes to try. This one was okay. I felt the soup lacked some flavor and will add some herbs like another review stated. I couldn’t find cauliflower in the store due to Hurricane Ian so I substituted some frozen riced cauliflower I had in my freezer. I also omitted the oil and sauteed the leeks and garlic with a splash of vegetable broth.
Let’s talk about those kale croutons, though. They were amazing and I’ll be making those to top a lot of dishes besides this soup!!!
Very easy to make & I really like the kale croutons. The soup itself was a bland so added some extra herbs to it for more flavor.
Haven’t tried it yet but planning on it. What’s the approximate weight of potatoes that you used? With potatoes varying in size, it would be nice to know the weight. Thanks.
Hi Patrick, I totally get that, thank you for the suggestion. The size/weight of the potatoes is really up to your preference. If you’d like larger servings, feel free to use bigger potatoes – it won’t affect the flavor because this soup packs flavor for days. Smaller potatoes – smaller portions, but same delicious flavor. Hope that helps!
Hi Patrick, great question! My suggested potato size would equate to about 1 cut-up potato = about 1 cup potatoes.
So for a recipe that calls for 4 potatoes, it a safe rule of them to say about 4 cups of chopped potatoes. 🙂
Delicious! I used an entire head of garlic that I had roasted in the oven ahead of time and it was so yummy. Don’t skip the kale croutons and nutritional yeast. A little sprinkle of Everything Bagel Seasoning on top doesn’t hurt either!
This recipe was so easy! Tasted incredible!!
Delicious and very filling. The coconut oil gives it an interesting favor.
Fabulous Fall soup recipe! Love the flavors of leeks & potatoes combined. This is a quick & easy one to prepare & loaded with veggies. The whole family loves this one – it’s definitely going into our rotation!
I was very surprised at how flavorful this soup was. I usually use a lot of dairy.
Simply delicious! Instead of blending, I kept the soup whole – I prefer soup chunky rather than creamy. The kale croutons were also simple and added a nice texture crunch on top.
This soup is delicious! It has a wonderful blend of flavors, feels nourishing to eat, and combines whole foods, which I love.