If you are looking for creative ways to serve up vegetables, then this Broccoli Cheese Soup is your answer! You can have this delicious warm-weather meal ready in about 30 minutes. Don't forget to top it with some crispy bacon to maximize the flavor!
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Please do me a favor though and don’t lie to your reluctant eaters about the veggies in this dish. If you want to wait until after they gobble it up, that is fine, but make it known that the deliciousness in this soup is broccoli (and cheese and bacon of course!). And when cheese and bacon are involved, it’s hard to go wrong. :) Enjoy!
Broccoli Cheese Soup (with bacon!)
If you are looking for creative ways to serve up vegetables, then this Broccoli Cheese Soup is your answer! You can have this delicious warm-weather meal ready in about 30 minutes. Don't forget to top it with some crispy bacon to maximize the flavor!
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Servings: 6 people
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Ingredients
- 3 slices bacon (cut into 1-inch pieces (locally sourced recommended))
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- ¼ cup onion (diced)
- 3 tablespoons whole-wheat flour
- 1 ¼ pounds broccoli (cut into 2-inch pieces)
- 4 cups chicken broth (homemade recommended)
- 1 cup milk
- ½ teaspoon salt
- pepper (to taste)
- ½ cup heavy cream
- 1 cup cheddar cheese (freshly shredded)
- bacon (cooked, optional garnish)
Instructions
- In a large soup pot over medium heat, cook the bacon pieces until brown and crisp, about 3 to 4 minutes.
- Add the olive oil and diced onion and allow it to cook and soften for another minute.
- Turn to medium-low, whisk in the flour, and cook while stirring for 1 to 2 minutes being careful not to let the flour burn.
- Add the broccoli pieces, broth, milk, salt, and pepper to the pot. Bring to a boil and then simmer on medium-low for 10 minutes.
- Blend until smooth with a hand immersion blender (or by transferring to a countertop blender in batches).
- Stir in the heavy cream and shredded cheese and serve warm. (You can freeze any leftovers.)
Notes
We recommend organic ingredients when feasible.
Nutrition Facts
Nutrition Facts
Broccoli Cheese Soup (with bacon!)
Amount Per Serving
Calories 291
Calories from Fat 198
% Daily Value*
Fat 22g34%
Saturated Fat 11g69%
Cholesterol 58mg19%
Sodium 1013mg44%
Potassium 542mg15%
Carbohydrates 13g4%
Fiber 3g13%
Sugar 4g4%
Protein 12g24%
Vitamin A 1135IU23%
Vitamin C 95.8mg116%
Calcium 251mg25%
Iron 1.3mg7%
* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.
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Made this exactly as written for the first time today. We loved it! Thank you for another wonderful recipe!
Lisa, when you have a gluten sensitivity do you have a recommendation for what to use in place of the whole wheat flour. I know corn starch is good as a replacement but how does that work with the “Whole Food” concept
Hi Pat, since we don’t focus on specific dietary restrictions, we would recommend reaching out to either a nutritionist or GF food blogger for recommendations. Our friend Kiran at Easy Real Food uses Coconut Flour a lot in her recipes. – Nicole
My family love this recipe. I always add 4 potatoes for double batch. I also add carrots and roux to make it thicker.
Can you use thawed frozen broccoli in place of fresh?
You can definitely add frozen broccoli to the soup. I would recommend not thawing it beforehand, just simply add it frozen when directed to. – Nicole
Any reccomendations on what to replace the bacon with? One of my daughters is anaphylactic to Pork and I cannot eat it, either. Thanks!
You can totally omit the bacon. It will, of course, change the flavor of the end product, but I think it would still be really good! It may need a little extra salt though so be sure to check for that. – Nicole
As Nicole mentioned, you could omitting the bacon and add a little extra salt, but it would be even better if you used smoked salt. – Jason
I make a similar soup and it is a family favorite. To boost up the veggies I have added carrots, celery, cauliflower, parsnips etc, We like it chunky and I just crush it with a potato masher near the end. although it is amazing with heavy cream or half and half, to cut down on fat I have used canned evaporated milk and I do not use flour as crushing the veggies thickens it up nicely.
What would be the best way to condense this recipe? (Looking to replace Campbell’s condensed broccoli cheese soup in one of my husband’s favorite recipes)
Hi. That is not something we have tried.
I suggest using half the liquids called for in the recipe, since when you reconstitute canned soups you add a can of water. Of course you’ll have probably 3 cans worth of “condensed” soup, but you could freeze the leftovers. ;-)
Used 5 pieces of diced bacon left over in the freezer. Came out wonderful ! Will double the batch next time.
Can I use half and half instead of heavy cream?
You can. Other readers have.
I saw this recipe calls for heavy cream. I have not been able to find heavy cream that does not contain carrageenan. I know this is an unhealthy ingredient. What are you thoughts? Use it anyways? Thanks
Hi there. This will help going forward: http://www.cornucopia.org/shopping-guide-to-avoiding-organic-foods-with-carrageenan/.
I recently read something about an immersion blender damaging pots… Now I’m on the fence about buying one. Have you had any issues with this?
Hi there. I’ve had no issue with mine on my stainless.
Wow.I m sure it is really good ….but with all the milk, cream , cheese and even the flour, it can not be very good for ones inflammation. This would make my CRP level go up for sure. Can you cut out those things and make in inflammation happy by using plain almond milk, coconut flour, well blended beans to use to thicken?
Hi Cathy. We’ve not attempted to make this gluten or dairy free. Let us know how it turns out if your do.
To cut back on some of the dairy, I substitute both the milk and heavy cream for one can of coconut milk. We enjoy it this way.
I’ll try this and update here :)
This recipe is a staple in our house! We have eaten it nearly every week for more than a year and it’s still going strong with the kids!
I’m not sure what percentage heavy cream is…but do you think it would work okay with 4.8% milk? That’s what we have to use for my daughter.
Hi. Other readers have used whole milk. It won’t be as rich as rich as heavy cream which contains 36% milk fat.
This soup is delicious! I had a bunch of broccoli needing to be used and today was cold and snowy where we live – this was a perfect choice for lunch. I have two toddlers and they both loved it!! It is creamy, cheesy, and totally delicious! We will definitely be using this recipe again!
I made this tonight and both of my kids loved it which is very rare. I’ve been looking for a broccoli cheese soup recipe and this is it! Thank you so much!
This is delicious and works just as well using frozen broccoli that’s been thawed :)
This is perfect! I’ve been looking for a great broccoli soup recipe for years. My husband said, “don’t change anything, I love it.” Thank you!!!
This is my son’s all time favourite dish!
People are amazed when in amongst all the others kids saying hot dogs, chocolate or whatever are their favourites that out comes a 5 year old voice saying broccoli soup! I often make it without the bacon too……….
Thank you for the great recipe
Very, very disappointed in this recipe. Its like creamy water. I doubled the recipe and it would barely be 6 severing sizes. Your family must eat very little food. I think its yummy but cannot be considered a dinner. Better as a base to add more to
You may be reviewing the wrong recipe. With 3 T of flour to thicken 5 cups of liquid plus the pureed broccoli, heavy cream, and cheese, this should make a nice thick soup.
Generally, a rich high-fat soup like this is served as an appetizer or side dish. As a lunch, it could be paired with a sandwich or salad. Most soups have around 100 calories per “serving,” even cream soups.
If divided into 6 servings, this has 277 kcal, 20 g of fat (!), 760 mg of sodium.
My husband and I eat a lot, but I would not make a meal out of a rich soup like this.
Sorry to hear it didn’t turn out for you. Did you make sure to add the flour to the bacon grease? Other readers have also said that Lisa’s homemade chicken broth does the trick too, along with adding some cauliflower to make it a little thicker. – Nicole
This was just ok for us. Like some other reviews, we thought it was much too runny and bland. I followed the recipe exactly, although I did use store bought broth. Used Cabot seriously sharp cheddar. It looked much more green than the pictured soup in the recipe, too.
A lot of readers said Lisa’s homemade broth is the tick. – Nicole
I made this soup a month or so ago, and had frozen 2-8oz jars in the freezer. Best find ever! I was scrounging for lunch today and saw them sitting there! Just as delicious as the day I made it! :)
My family LOVES this recipe. We double it every time we make it. The only change I have made is to double the amount of onion. Might try adding some garlic to it next time I make it. Love, love, love this!
I love this hearty recipe. Its very simple, and you can play around with the ingredients. Works great in a crock pot too.
I normally LOVE the recipes from this site, but this one wasn’t my favorite. I felt like the soup could have been thicker and more flavorful. I added nutmeg, and that helped somewhat with the flavor, ano tomorrow night when I serve this for dinner, I’m planning on adding another cup -at least – of cheese. Hopefully, this will help thicken it up a bit. I am so grateful for all the other amazing recipes that Lisa posts, so I’m not too heartbroken that one didn’t work as-is for me. Thanks for all you do!
Sorry to hear it wasn’t one of your favorites. Did you add the flour to the bacon grease? Maybe add some garlic, too, for more flavor. – Nicole
The whole family loves this soup! I love the large amount of broccoli and used extra sharp cheddar. Could have been thicker but only had 2% milk on hand. Now if we could only find a whole wheat bread bowl to serve it in. This was our Christmas dinner tonight.
I made this This week and was very pleased with the result. I didn’t find the need to add extra cheese as I used a sharp/old cheddar. Everyone loved it! Thanks!
I enjoyed using your recipe as a starting point…I actually used equal parts of Milk and Chicken Broth and tripled the cheese and used one pound of bacon and then added 2 blocks of Philadelphia cream cheese….and A LOT of Ground Pepper–oh and diced up some carrots for color….Holy Toledo!! YUMMY!!!! I did have to add several tablespoons of cornstarch as the flour alone wasn’t enough to thicken!! We are going to enjoy it tonight and I bet it will be even BETTER Tomorrow !!! Love the idea of Bacon in my Cream of Broccoli and Cheese soup….I wish I would have cooked some chicken to plop in….maybe in Round Two!! MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!
Sounds yummy, but not nearly as healthy. I don’t know if I could feed that to my family on a regular basis.
Hmmm…the pic looks like it’s more cheesy, but mine turned out a lot more broccoli’ish (is that a word? LOL!) I couldn’t taste the cheese at all. My hubby liked it, but I would’ve preferred it more cheesy tasting. I had about 1& 1/4 lbs. of broccoli, and didn’t even use all of that because I cut a lot of the stems off. Any thoughts?
Hi there. Using a sharper cheddar might help.
Do you really cook the bacon in the same pot? What about the grease?
Hi Susan. You can always make the bacon in a separate pan. You will lose a bit of the bacon flavor, however. ~Amy
Delicious! Our family loved this!
I made this tonight and I loved the flavor, but the consistency was really grainy–I was hoping for a creamy soup. Did I over mix it or not mix it enough? Where do you think my error was?
Thanks for the recipes! I have found so many here and in the book that my family and I love!
Hi Judy. Did you use an immersion blender? The other question I would ask is did you use full fat cheese. ~Amy
Can you use olive oil instead if bacon grease…trying to make it vegetarian.
Thanks
Heather, the bacon grease, along with the extra olive oil and flour produces the roux. For this recipe, omitting the bacon will change the flavor and consistency, but maybe try adding some cauliflower to thicken it up a bit. – Nicole
So delicious and easy. I have today and tomorrow off from work, so I’m doing a bunch cooking and putting things in the freezer. I’ll be making the tomato bisque after my soup pot is finished with its bath in the dishwasher.
Has anyone used water instead of broth? I have a little one with tons of allergies and he is allergic to chicken and many ingredients in the veggie broths also. Just wondering how bland it would be without the broth.
Have you tried making your own veggie broth? That way you can eliminate the things he is allergic to.
Hi! Has anyone tried this in a crockpot? I was thinking after the blending process I could switch it to a crockpot and keep it on low? Hosting a brunch and wanted to have it warm. Thanks!
Hi Alicia. That should be okay. Here’s a crock pot recipe that might help in converting the recipe:http://skinnyms.com/slow-cooker-broccoli-cheddar-soup/. ~Amy
Thank you so much! After I added the cream and cheese, I let it cook a few minutes, then transferred it to a crockpot on Keep Warm. It tasted delicious! Thank you so much for the additional recipe!