40 Soups That Freeze Fantastically
Although they seem like opposing forces of nature, soup and the freezer make a great team when it comes to meal planning. Freezing a soup you just made will keep it fresh for the future, or just provide a more efficient way to preserve leftovers. These soups are free of foods that don't freeze well, like heavy cream, coconut milk, and cheese, to ensure the best possible thawed soup experience. If you're cooking soup that'll go straight into the freezer, you'll want to make a few adjustments. Don't add pasta or grains like rice, before freezing. Instead, prepare them while you're defrosting the corresponding soup to avoid altering the texture. Similarly, it helps to undercook vegetable-heavy soups, because they will continue cooking when reheated. For more information, check out our guide to freezing soup.
Easy Chili
Look no further for the ultimate, easy chili recipe. You may think you know how to make chili, but our homemade chili recipe is a gamechanger. With just a push of a button, your weekday dinner is taken care of as the chili cooks away in the slow-cooker. Add chili to your next barbeque to top grilled sausages for an upgraded version of chili dogs. You can easily substitute ground turkey instead of beef for a lighter option and the rest of the ingredients should already be stocked away in your pantry. To top the hot, spicy chili, add shredded Cheddar cheese and corn chips for extra flavor and texture. To go beyond our favorite classic recipe, find more chili recipes here.
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Smoky Ham and Split Pea Soup
Smoky Ham and Split Pea Soup Recipe
This split pea and ham soup turns out creamy and delicious every time, all thanks to your slow cooker. Salty ham balances out the peas' light, earthy flavor, while the potatoes slowly release their starches to create the perfect silky texture. After 8 hours of hands-off, crockpot cooking, this split pea and ham soup is ready to devour (although leftovers fare well in the freezer, too). An easy, excellent recipe to add to your fall/winter rotation, this filling and flavorful split pea and ham soup is sure to become a new favorite in your house. Top with freshly cracked pepper and serve with a side of crusty bread.
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Stuffed Cabbage Soup
Tender cabbage and crushed tomatoes in a rich broth make for a perfect cold weather soup. Fluffy white rice brings added texture and heartiness while fresh herbs contribute a bright flavor to his veggie-packed dish. Plus, this soup freezes beautifully so you can easily make it ahead of time to save for a cold, wintery day.
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Summer Minestrone Soup
A gentle simmer keeps the vegetables in the soup slightly firm, so they maintain their texture during freezing and reheating.
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Instant Pot Tex-Mex Chicken and Black Bean Soup
Instant Pot Tex-Mex Chicken and Black Bean Soup Recipe
This filling and flavorful soup is ideal for a chilly evening. Freeze leftover chipotle chiles and adobe sauce in a flattened Ziploc bag for future use. Want to make this soup in your slow cooker? Click here for the recipe.
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Bacon and Beef Stew
Savory, rich bacon and beef pair perfectly with beer, mustard, and red wine vinegar creating a well-rounded, complex flavor profile. The recipe comes together quickly and makes 16 cups--enough for 12 generous servings. Make sure to use low sodium beef broth to keep a balanced salt level. Serve with crusty bread, cornbread, or butter rolls.
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Slow Cooker Creamy Lentil Soup
Slow Cooker Creamy Lentil Soup Recipe
Simple flavors and a rustic touch will make this soup an instant home-cooked favorite, especially on chilly, wintry days. Inexpensive dried lentils make up the bulk of the soup, helping fill in your fiber gaps and keep you full longer. Chickpeas are the secret ingredient to achieve supreme creaminess, which become delightfully smooth when blended, and sneak in an extra 3g fiber per serving.
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Caribbean Black Bean Soup
Caribbean Black Bean Soup Recipe
A little of this spicy soup goes a long way, so it's best when served as an appetizer soup. If you want to decrease the heat, seed the jalapeños.
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Turkey and Andouille Sausage Gumbo
Turkey and Andouille Sausage Gumbo Recipe
This gumbo is a great use for leftover roasted turkey, though cooked chicken will also work. We skip the long-stirred roux here in favor of filé powder, a thickener made from the sassafras plant; look for it on the spice aisle. For the best results, stir in the filé powder off the heat.
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Creamy White Bean Soup with Smoked Ham Hocks
Creamy White Bean Soup with Smoked Ham Hocks Recipe
Creamy, starchy, and filling, this hearty, rustic soup is the epitome of comfort. And convenient: Beans go in dry--no need to soak.
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Hearty Chicken Soup
It makes sense that a classic like chicken soup would be best cooked in a classic Dutch oven. While we enjoyed the soup from all three cooking methods, the Dutch oven made the meat a little more tender and juicy. The broth also simmers without a lid, so it reduces and grows richer.
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Spiced Winter Squash Soup
Spiced Winter Squash Soup Recipe
Smooth and custardy, silken tofu blends perfectly with the butternut squash and pumpkin to create the ultimate velvety texture. And thanks to its protein and fiber, the dish is quite filling—your family won't even know it's completely vegan.
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Field Peas in Herbed Broth Soup
Field Peas in Herbed Broth Soup Recipe
If you're lucky enough to get your hands on a mess of freshly picked field peas, this simple soup will let their unique, earthy flavor shine. While most varieties of field peas can be used interchangeably in recipes, we recommend using lady peas (also called Lady Cream peas) here because they produce a clear, not cloudy, potlikker.
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Onion, Kale, Chickpea, and Chicken Soup
Onion, Kale, Chickpea, and Chicken Soup Recipe
Few things beat a steaming bowl of veggie-packed chicken soup on a crisp autumn evening, and this one happens to be a perfect potion for the seasonal chills. You can leave the thyme sprigs in the broth (just ladle around them) so they'll keep releasing herbaceous goodness into any leftovers.
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Silky Tomato Soup with White Beans and Garlic Oil
Silky Tomato Soup with White Beans and Garlic Oil Recipe
Creamy, silky tomato soup is the ultimate comfort food. We've elevated the traditional soup with the addition of white cannellini beans and toasty garlic oil. You won't miss any of the cream or calories from this dairy-free tomato soup as the texture is still silky from blending the tomato base. Serve alongside our revamped Grilled Cheese Skillet "Panini" for a meal kids and adults will all approve of. With the addition of the white beans, each serving provides 8 grams of protein making this vegetarian meal foolproof.
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Slow Cooker Tuscan White Bean Soup
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Slow Cooker Chicken, Bacon, and Potato Soup
Slow Cooker Chicken, Bacon, and Potato Soup Recipe
This chicken potato soup is perfect for ushering in fall: It's hearty enough for the beginning of soup season, yet brothy and veggie-packed so it doesn't feel too heavy. This recipe is ideal for a weekend, when you can check on the slow cooker after just a few hours. Although you can't leave it unattended all day, this chicken potato soup still offers the benefit of hands-free, fuss-free cooking. Baby red, Yukon Gold, or fingerling potatoes will all work well here, as they'll maintain their shape nicely during cooking. Pair this easy chicken and potato soup with a slaw or kale side salad and crusty whole-grain bread for a healthy, satisfying dinner.
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Vegetarian Pozole
Plan to put this easy and comforting vegetarian pozole on repeat all season long. The vibrant stew offers the smoky, delicately spicy, and bright flavors characteristic of traditional pozole, simply without the pork. Fresh spinach and red kidney beans add color and hearty texture, while also upping the iron and protein content of the pozole. So whether you or loved ones follow a meat-free diet or are simply looking to cut back a little on the animal protein, it's a perfect (not to mention, perfectly simple) dish that's sure to impress.
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Warming Beet Soup
7 Fast and Filling Soups: Perfect for fast days, cook these meals, and then take single portions. Lose weight the 5:2 way. This healthy recipe is featured in the soups section of the new 5:2 Starter's Guide to The 2-Day Diet. The book provides a selection of over 100 tasty recipes to help you meet the daily 500 calorie allotment for the 2 days of intermittent fasting, as required by the 5:2 Diet.
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Slow-Cooker Jambalaya Soup
Slow-Cooker Jambalaya Soup Recipe
Look for andouille near the smoked sausages in the refrigerated section of your grocery store. Want to make this soup in your Instant Pot? Click here for the recipe.
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Warm-Spiced Butternut Squash Soup
Warm-Spiced Butternut Squash Soup Recipe
Earthy, fragrant spices like allspice, cloves, and cinnamon make wonderful accents for the natural sweetness of butternut squash. Make sure to simmer the squash until very tender--the softer it gets, the silkier the puree.
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Chard and White Bean Soup
Chard and White Bean Soup Recipe
While the soup simmers, brush some slices of country bread or levain with olive oil and toast them, to serve with the hot soup.
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Black Garlic and Lentil Soup
Black Garlic and Lentil Soup Recipe
For Bar Tartine in San Francisco, chef Nick Balla created this smoky, earthy soup as a tribute to his Hungarian-America father. Dried chiles, paprika sausage, hot paprika, and black garlic--regular garlic roasted for days until it turns sweet and jet black, with a licorice-like flavor--give the soup a rounded spiciness.
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Southwestern Chicken Soup
Southwestern Chicken Soup Recipe
This top-rated Southwestern chicken soup is a great way to use up leftover chicken. The creamy chunks of avocado add a richness that's unusual to find in most chicken soups.
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Instant Pot Butternut Squash Soup with Chorizo
Instant Pot Butternut Squash Soup with Chorizo Recipe
For an easy and elegant fall entertaining dish you can make in your Instant Pot, look no further than our savory butternut squash soup. This Instant Pot butternut squash soup is a perfect recipe for effortless autumnal vibes. Featuring chorizo sausage and spices like cumin and chili powder, matched with butternut squash's inherent sweetness, this Instant Pot soup exudes seasonal warmth. It's excellent when served with crusty bread and a green salad for a light entree, but also makes for a fantastic appetizer served in smaller portions. A speedy and flavorful twist on classic butternut squash soup, our Instant Pot version delivers a delightful blend of textures and flavors in each bite thanks to toppings that make the dish as beautiful as it is delicious.
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Vegetable-Beef Soup
Slow-cooking top round steak with tomatoes, garlic, onion, and Worcestershire sauce creates a succulent soup full of tender beef. This soup is sure to please the whole family.
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Pressure Cooker Brunswick Stew
Pressure Cooker Brunswick Stew Recipe
For our largely hands-off take on the classic comfort food, we create an intensely flavorful base by first pressure cooking a whole chicken on top of a combination of boxed tomatoes, potatoes, onions, and a handful of flavor power player ingredients. While using a whole bird definitely contributes to a slightly lengthier cook time (as compared to using already cut chicken), this cooking technique is a huge part of what makes the rich and delicious backbone of this stew, without adding additional chicken stock or water. With the tomatoes, vinegar, sugar, Worcestershire, and mustard, we hit the flavor notes of making this potluck staple with BBQ sauce (which is a commonly called for component of Brunswick Stew), but the result is infinitely tastier and more dynamic than what you'd get by dumping in a store-bought bottle. In addition to the lima beans and corn called for here, sliced okra would also make a great veggie addition. While hearty in terms of texture, this dish is balanced by an abundance of bright flavors we can't get enough of.
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Ham, Kale, and White Bean Soup
Ham, Kale, and White Bean Soup Recipe
The water used to cook a pot of beans is really liquid gold, infused with aromatics and thickened with starch from the beans. It makes perfect sense to give the cooking liquid a second life as the broth for the soup (and save the trouble of rinsing and draining). The ham hock will season the broth and the beans as they cook; you won't need additional salt once they are done. Instead of cooking the kale and carrots in the soup, give them a quick sauté and stir them in at the end so they retain their vibrancy.
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Two-Bean Soup with Tomato-Chive Crostini
Two-Bean Soup with Tomato-Chive Crostini Recipe
For a vegetarian version of this bean soup, substitute the chicken broth for a vegetable mushroom broth. Garnish with a tomato-chive crostini for added crunch to this 30 minute soup.
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Slow Cooker Chicken Chili
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Mexican Chicken Stew
Ground guajillo chile powder found in Mexican markets is quite different from regular chili powder. This spicy chicken soup recipe is made simple with the pressure cooking power of your Instant Pot.
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Tomato-Red Pepper Gazpacho with Fresh Vegetable Medley
Tomato-Red Pepper Gazpacho with Fresh Vegetable Medley Recipe
Topping tomato and red pepper-flavored gazpacho with fresh veggies makes a refreshing summer soup.
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Instant Pot Sambhar
This dish is traditionally prepared with sambar spice, a mixture of ground spices and lentils—what we have here is a simplified version that still provides lots of layers of flavor and just the right amount of heat. This recipe has a lot of steps, so give yourself plenty of time for the pressure cooker to return to pressure between cooking the lentils and the sweet potatoes. Despite the high involvement, the different elements of this recipe all come together at the same time.
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Vegetable-Lentil Soup
After a hectic day at work, hearty bowlfuls of Vegetable-Lentil Soup await you in the slow cooker.
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Instant Pot Two-Minute Taco Soup
Instant Pot Two-Minute Taco Soup Recipe
Dinner doesn't get any easier than this tasty taco soup that the whole family will love.
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Smoky Two-Bean Vegetarian Chili
Smoky Two-Bean Vegetarian Chili Recipe
A wee bit of canned chipotle chiles goes a long way in infusing this hearty chili with rich, smoky flavor and a hint of heat. (Cost for 4: $4.69)
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Smoky White Bean Soup
Soups are the most comforting dishes for fall and winter nights. But if you want to do homemade soup right, you have to spend hours letting the broth simmer or leave it in the slow cooker all day. Not anymore! You might not believe us, but this Smoky White Bean Soup is ready from start to finish in just 25 minutes. That's less time than it takes Mama to put her face on! Not only is this recipe super quick, but it cooks in one pot. A 25-minute, one-dish recipe that's comforting and filling is a winner in every sense of the word. This recipe starts with one of our favorite things—bacon—but only one thick-cut slice of bacon, so make it an extra thick slice. This recipe is so easy because that you're not chopping your time away. Pre-chopped onion, pre-chopped celery, one minced garlic clove, and a teaspoon of chopped fresh thyme are next in the pan, and they cook right in the bacon drippings. Talk about yum. Add chicken broth, cannellini beans, one chopped and seeded plum tomato, one bay leaf, salt, and pepper, and you're done. Really, we wouldn't lie! This soup only simmers for eight minutes after it's brought to a boil, and it's ready to eat. This recipe is so easy to whip up the fastest lunch or dinner ever, and you can make it ahead to take to work for the most comforting brown-bag lunch in the office.
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Slow Cooker Chicken Posole
Slow Cooker Chicken Posole Recipe
Think of posole as chili's brothier, lighter cousin, a Mexican version of chicken soup. Posole is also a name for the hominy, or rehydrated dried corn, that goes in the dish.
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Savory Sausage, Veggie, and Gnocchi Soup
Savory Sausage, Veggie, and Gnocchi Soup Recipe
Turkey sausage, sweet butternut squash, earthy mushrooms, shallots, and spinach come together to make a big bowl of delicious comfort. The colors stay intact, and the sausage is perfect for sopping up with some crusty French bread. Best of all, it's fast and easy, and you can dress it up or down. Turkey Italian sausage has less fat, but still retains lots of flavor. Brown the shallots and mushrooms first—since the turkey sausage doesn't have much fat, it will burn on the bottom of the pot. This soup also works well as leftovers, especially with crusty bread.
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Instant Pot Pumpkin Soup with Candied Pepitas
Instant Pot Pumpkin Soup with Candied Pepitas Recipe
This velvety smooth soup is easy to make and easy to freeze. The crunchy pepitas steal the show, and are a nice contrast to the spicy, creamy base. Serve with sourdough bread for a nontraditional Thanksgiving dinner, or in small shooters as a holiday party appetizer.