Leek and potato soup: a velvety cream, or thick with pieces
A soup from three leeks, a few potatoes and butter that costs pennies and tastes like a French bistro's. The leeks are sweated slowly in butter until sweet, the potatoes give body without flour, and cream at the end gives velvet. Blend it to a cream or leave it chunky, like a grandmother's soup. Butter croutons and chives on top.
Your own work in that: 20 min.
- Washing and chopping 15 min
- Sweating and simmering 25 min
- Blending and croutons 5 min
Step by step
0 / 6 doneWash the leeks thoroughly
Cut off the roots and the dark green leaves (keep them for stock). Slit each leek lengthways to the middle, fan the layers open like a book and rinse under running water until no sand remains. Grit gets between the layers as the leek grows and is invisible from outside.
Ingredients: 3 pcs leeks · 600 g potatoes · 1 pcs onion · 50 g butter · 1200 ml vegetable or chicken stock · 150 ml whipping cream (30%) · 1 pinch nutmeg · 1 tsp salt · ½ tsp white or black pepper
TipOne gritty mouthful ruins the whole soup. If in doubt, cover the sliced leeks with water in a bowl, swirl, and lift them out from the top with a sieve: the sand stays on the bottom.
Slit lengthways, fanned, rinsedChop
Slice the leeks into thin half-rings, dice the onion, peel the potatoes and cut into 2 cm cubes.
Leeks thin, potatoes in cubesSweat the leeks in butter
Melt the butter in a large pot, add the leeks and onion, a pinch of salt, and sweat over low heat, covered, 10 minutes, stirring now and then. They should be soft, glossy and sweet, not browned: browned leek turns bitter and the soup goes grey.
Slowly, covered, no browningSimmer with the potatoes
Add the potatoes, pour in hot stock, bring to the boil and simmer 15 minutes, until the potatoes collapse under a fork.
A quarter of an hour, until the potatoes are softBlend, or leave chunky
For a cream: blend with a stick blender until smooth, 2 minutes. For a chunky soup: crush some of the potatoes with a masher right in the pot and leave the rest. Pour in the cream, add the nutmeg, salt and pepper, heat without boiling. Too thick? Add stock.
TipDon't blend potatoes in a jug blender at high speed: the starch turns gluey. A stick blender, briefly, is enough.
Cream or masher, cream at the endCroutons and serving
Cut the bread into cubes and brown in butter 3 minutes, stirring. Serve the soup with croutons and chives. Keeps 3 days in the fridge; it thickens, so reheat with a little milk.
Ingredients: 2 pcs bread · 20 g butter · ½ bunch chives
Butter croutons, chives
Before you start
With bacon
100 g diced smoked bacon fried crisp, scattered on top instead of croutons. The bistro soup turns into an inn soup.
With blue cheese
50 g blue cheese melted into the cream at the end: a bold French version for a cold evening.
Cold
Blended, chilled overnight, with extra cream and chives: vichyssoise, a summer soup for a heatwave.
