Mushroom Soup
It’s easy enough to sauté up some mushrooms in butter, then add some flour, broth followed by a good glug of cream, and call it a day. And while it will taste just fine, it won’t really taste that much like mushrooms, except for the bites you get with mushroom bits in it. So in presenting you with a mushroom soup recipe I wanted to make sure it actually tasted like – gasp, shock, horror – mushrooms! And how do we achieve that? Simple: Blitz the soup! Only this way can we release all the gorgeous, sweet and earthy flavours locked up in the mushrooms into every luscious, creamy mouthful!!
What goes in Mushroom Soup
1. Mushrooms!
Swiss Brown / cremini mushrooms have a stronger mushroom flavour than regular white / button mushrooms but make the soup browner. So I like to use a combination of both Swiss Brown and standard white mushrooms. This gives you the best of both worlds: an intense mushroom flavour with an elegant pale cream colour rather than a (very) brown one! (Fun fact: White / button, Swiss Brown / cremini and portobello mushrooms are actually all the same mushroom – just in different stages of the mushroom’s life cycle. True story!)
2. Mushroom Soup – other ingredients
One really nice thing about this Mushroom Soup recipe is how few ingredients are actually called for. Why gild the lily with extra unnecessary flavourings when we already have a soup full of beautiful mushroom flavour!
Vegetable stock – Store-bought stock works fine here, but I really recommend trying this with Homemade Vegetable Stock one of these days! Vegetable stock is much easier and less messy to make than meat-based stocks like beef stock and chicken stock, calling for just basic vegetables and flavourings (carrot, celery, onion, garlic, parsley, thyme, bay leaf, peppercorns, coriander seeds);Cream, or creme fraiche – This adds a luxuriously velvety mouthfeel to the soup so I really recommend not skipping it. If you don’t have either, stir in a knob of butter at the end. Cream or creme fraiche? Cream is the obvious option, but I’ve also suggested creme fraiche for something a bit different. What exactly is creme fraiche, anyway? Creme fraiche is a lightly soured cream, and unsurprisingly tastes like a cross between sour cream and heavy/thickened cream. It has the same velvety richness of cream with a slight tanginess (but not as tangy as sour cream). It’s also thicker like sour cream and can be dolloped rather than poured. It lends a lovely faintly sharpened note to the soup.Which is better? I’d go cream for every day purposes, and reserve creme fraiche for company (yes, it’s more expensive and not carried by all grocery stores). But it’s no lesser a soup with “just” plain cream, I assure you!Onion and garlic – Essential flavour base; andButter – For sautéing.
How to make Mushroom Soup
This soup is very straightforward to make, but there is time involved in sautéing and simmering. This task is essential to bring out all the wonderful flavours! Cream or creme fraiche? Cream is the obvious option, but I’ve also suggested creme fraiche for something a bit different. What exactly is creme fraiche, anyway? Creme fraiche is a lightly soured cream, and unsurprisingly tastes like a cross between sour cream and heavy/thickened cream. It has the same velvety richness of cream with a slight tanginess (but not as tangy as sour cream). It’s also thicker like sour cream and can be dolloped rather than poured. It lends a lovely faintly sharpened note to the soup. Which is better? I’d go cream for every day purposes, and reserve creme fraiche for company (yes, it’s more expensive and not carried by all grocery stores). But it’s no lesser a soup with “just” plain cream, I assure you! I added some golden sautéed slices of mushrooms for the photos, as a cue so you’d know what this bowl of brown liquid actually is. I must confess I’ve never done that in real life before!! 😂 Stick blender option: You could also use a stick blender, but I find that it doesn’t puree the soup as smoothly as pictured. It works fine, but a blender is better; and
Oh and as I always say when sharing a soup recipe, bread for dunking really is not optional. I say it is in the recipe, but everyone knows I’m lying through my teeth! – Nagi x PS. I guess I should follow that cheeky statement up with some bread recommendations! 😂 Here are my top 3 picks: Or choose your own bread recipe!
Watch how to make it
More vegetable soups
Life of Dozer
Builders are here jackhammering up a concrete slab all day today, and I can’t find Dozer’s earplugs. So I sent him off to spend the day with the golden retriever boarder!
