The Best Broccoli and Cheese Soup

This extra-cheesy and flavorful creamy broccoli cheese soup is loaded with broccoli. The base is thick and creamy and is prepared without flour thanks to potatoes! This soup has all the flavor you'd expect but fewer calories. Jump to the Recipe for Broccoli Cheddar Soup!

Broccoli cheddar soup is frequently made using a foundation of flour, butter, and milk. Making cheese sauce for macaroni and cheese follows a similar process. Melt the butter, stir in the flour, then add the milk and heat through until the milk becomes thick. This method of making broccoli soup is great, but we find it to be a little too thick.

In our healthier version, we use just one potato to thicken instead of the traditional butter and flour paste. This eliminates the requirement for flour, cuts the amount of butter in half, and eliminates the need for many cups of milk.

Amazingly, our soup is creamy, rich, and tasty despite eliminating all those components! So much so that you won't even notice their absence. Try our roasted cauliflower soup for another simple, creamy soup.

How to Prepare Broccoli Cheddar Soup

This recipe might sound somewhat familiar if you've already prepared our creamy vegetable soup. Remember that the complete recipe is below; the basic steps are listed below.

In a little butter, cook onions and whole garlic cloves (no need to mince!) until they are soft and sweet.

Potato chunks, broccoli stalks (the florets are used later), salt, pepper, red pepper flakes (for spice), and a teaspoon of Dijon mustard are all added in at this point. Everything should be covered with water or broth and cooked until soft. In this soup, I've discovered that water works just well. Although it would seem like we should use broth to offer additional flavor, utilizing water lets the broccoli take center stage. When preparing this tomato soup, we follow the same procedure.

Blend the soup after cooking the first half of the broccoli florets until they are green and soft. I make things simple with my immersion blender. Those broccoli florets are still bright green because we refrained from adding them, adding beauty to our soup.

The remaining broccoli florets can now be added to the soup, which is now incredibly creamy, and cooked until they are bright green and soft. This makes the soup's base green and creamy while still giving you a few little broccoli bits.

If you want your soup to be especially creamy, toss in 1/2 cup of half-and-half after adding lots of shredded extra sharp white cheddar cheese. Whole milk and cream are combined to make half-and-half, which is offered in the US. Milk or cream can also be used instead.

The end of that. Broccoli cheddar soup that is unusually creamy and green. Our favorite!

Advice: Purchase broccoli with stalks

If you can locate it, buy broccoli for this dish that has long stalks. The stalks taste amazing and are excellent when cooked with the potato as the base of this soup. We will walk you through preparing the stalks in the recipe that follows.

You can still prepare this soup if you can't get broccoli with the stalks intact. First, sauté around half of the two pounds of broccoli florets instead of the stalks with the potato (as suggested in the recipe). Follow the recipe's instructions to add the remaining florets later after you've saved them for later.

The Best Broccoli and Cheddar Soup

This broccoli cheese soup is especially cheesy and flavorful thanks to the broccoli. It is cooked without flour and butter, and a potato provides the thick, creamy basis! When purchasing broccoli for this soup, seek for long stems. The stalks are chopped and cooked with the potatoes. The potato and stalks are quickly blended to create a wonderful, creamy soup. You can still cook the soup even if all you can find is broccoli heads or florets. See the article for our advice.

• PREP: 15 min
• COOK: 35 min
• TOTAL: 50 min
• Serving: 6 yields

WATCH HOW TO MAKE THE SOUP RECIPE

INGREDIENTS

• 1 large onion, finely chopped
• 4 medium garlic cloves, peeled and smashed
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter or olive oil
• 2 pounds broccoli with stalks
• 3/4 teaspoon fine sea salt, plus more to taste
• 1/2 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
• 1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes, omit if sensitive to spice
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 1 medium-to-large potato, peeled and chopped
• 1 bay leaf
• 4 cups water or broth
• 1/2 cup half and half, optional
• 8 ounces sharp cheddar cheese, grated, about 2 cups
• Thinly sliced chives, for serving, optional
• Fish sauce, is optional, see notes

INSTRUCTIONS

BROCCOLI PREPARATION

• Cut the stalks from the florets. Cut the broccoli florets into small, bite-sized pieces, leaving the stalks aside (watch our video for reference). The florets should be placed in a basin and saved for later.
• Take hold of the broccoli stalks and trim off approximately one inch of each stalk's bottom before discarding it. Slice the stalks into 1/2-inch pieces after removing the fibrous outer layer using a vegetable peeler.

MAKING THE SOUP

• Over medium heat, melt the butter in a big pot similar to a Dutch oven. Toss in the onion and garlic cloves after it has melted. About 5 minutes of cooking time, with periodic stirring, should result in soft, sweet-smelling onions.
• Add the chopped broccoli stalks, potato, 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, 3/4 teaspoon Dijon mustard, and red pepper flakes (if using). Add the bay leaf and four cups of water after cooking for two minutes. The soup should first be brought to a boil before being simmered gently. Cook the broccoli and potatoes for about 15 minutes at a low simmer.
• Add approximately half of the broccoli florets to the soup, cover with a lid, and cook for 3 to 5 minutes, or until they are brilliant green and soft. Our soup will remain green thanks to the addition of the florets at this stage.
• After removing the bay leaf and turning off the heat, puree the soup with an immersion blender until it is smooth. You can also puree the soup in a blender, but be sure to work in small batches, only fill it halfway, and keep the lid firmly in place. Steam can build up inside the blender as a result of hot liquids, and the top may then come off.
• Return the saucepan to the fire and heat it at a medium temperature. Once more covering the pot, stir in the remaining broccoli florets and cook for 3 to 5 minutes, or until they are bright green and tender.
• Add the cheese and half-and-half after that. Taste the soup after the cheese has melted into it, and add more salt and pepper if necessary. Add a couple dashes of fish sauce for an explosion of flavor. Sprinkle chives over top before serving.

TIPS FROM ADAM AND JOANNE

• Green up the soup: Just before blending the soup, add a few handfuls of baby spinach leaves and let them wilt into it somewhat to give it an even more brilliant green hue (30 to 45 seconds).
• Although it is optional, fish sauce gives sauces and soups, like this broccoli cheese soup, a beautiful flavor. The soup is beautifully season with two to three dashes. Consider fish sauce to be salt on a high dose. The flavor of the soup is enhanced without giving it a fishy character.
• Recipe inspired by our creamy veggie soup!
• Nutritional information: The numbers below are approximations. To calculate rough numbers, we used the USDA database.

NUTRITION PER SERVING: Serving Size 1/6 of the recipe / Calories 295 / Total Fat 19.2g / Saturated Fat 11g / Cholesterol 54.7mg / Sodium 627.3mg / Carbohydrate 19.3g / Dietary Fiber 5.1g / Total Sugars 5g / Protein 14.4g

AUTHOR: Adam and Joanne Gallagher #inspiredtaste

Try this Recipe for Delectable Roasted Butternut Squash Soup