Roasted Potato Soup
- Tracy Scheckel
- Feb 26
- 3 min read
Potato soup is one of those comfort foods, but also the base for multitudes of different kinds of chowders. Before I go on, I should share my definitions of soup, stew, chowder, and bisque. (If you want just the roasted potato soup recipe, feel free to skip ahead of this rabbit hole trip.)
I actually did some internet searching around to see if there is a clear-cut answer to what defines each, and there doesn't seem to be, just lots of opinion. So here's mine:
Soup: a combination of seasonings, vegetables, maybe meat or shellfish, a starch, and broth (chicken, vegetable, beef, pork, tomato, or miso). Typically, the broth is not thickened but may contain cream or milk for creamed soups.
Stew: braised meat and drippings thickened with flour, vegetables, potatoes, seasonings, broth, and maybe some wine, dark beer, or bourbon. The liquid here is thick and more gravy-like.
Chowder: The base is combination of cooked pureed potatoes and onions and maybe some broth. Add to it, any combination of the following and name it accordingly: cooked bacon and some of its fat, onions, celery, carrots, leeks, seafood, ham, corn kernels,, peas...... (I'm sure I missed something, but you get the picture).
Bisque: The delicate cousin of chowder, this is a smooth and creamy dish that is the product of making a seafood stock, then removing shells and pureeing most of the seafood. Sometimes I make a light roux flavored with some sherry to add some body to the broth which is otherwise a combination of the fish stock and some cream with the pureed seafood.
By these definitions, my basic potato soup is a chowder. It's simple to make: I peel and cube potatoes and chunk a large onion. I put it all in a stock pot, add enough water to cover, some salt, and boil until everything is tender. (making sure there's always just enough liquid to cover the potatoes and onion).
Once the potato is cooked soft, I transfer everything to a large mixing bowl (including liquid) and let it cool. I then place a few tablespoons of butter, cut up bacon, diced onion, carrots, and celery in the stock pot and simmer until the bacon is cooked and the veges are soft.
When the potato mixture is cool, I carefully ladle it into a blended (no more than a cup or 2 at a time) and puree it in batches and return it to the stock pot. You can puree as much or as little as you want depending on how chunky with potatoes you want it.
Once it's all pureed and in the stockpot, you can add cream, milk, or broth to get it to the consistency you want. At that point you have potato soup (chowder), but this is where you can start adding to it for corn chowder, seafood chowder, etc.
And we emerge from the rabbit hole to discover that the recipe I'm sharing here is totally different from what I just described. One day I got it in my head that roasted potatoes in my soup would add another dimension to the flavor....
THE RECIPE:
2-3 lb. potatoes cut into chunks leaving the skin on
1 large onion cut into chunks
salt, pepper, garlic powder to taste
2-2T 1/4c1/4 - 1/2 lb bacon cut into bite-sized pieces
1-2c Vegetable or other broth
1/2 to 1c cream 1/2&1/2. or whole milk
Heat the oven to 400 degrees
toss the potatoes and onions with the olive oil and seasonings
spread the mixture out on a parchment or silicone lined baking sheet with sides.
Bake until potatoes begin to get crispy on the edges turning every 10 minutes or so.
Place bacon in a stockpot on medium heat and add potatoes and onion .
Simmer to cook the bacon stirring frequently
When potatoes and golden and bacon is cooked completely, add a bit of broth to deglaze any potato that may have stuck to the pot.
Reduce heat to very low and with a potato masher, mash the potatoes unto a chunky texture.
Add broth to moisten if necessary while mashing.
Once the texture is where you want it, add cream gradually until the soup (chowder) is at your preferred thickness. Taste a bit and season further with salt, pepper, or even a dash of Worcestershire sauce.
If you make this ahead or have leftovers, use some broth or cream to thin it out when you reheat it.
