Roasted Beet and Potato Soup

duonyte's Note:

I recently roasted five pounds of beets and have been using them for side dishes. I decided to make soup last night, and it turned out quite nice. You may get more servings, but we really like our soup and 4 servings is all I got. I am sure that canned beets would also work quite well. I like evaporated milk because it brings richness with fewer calories, but half-and-half would also be good. I don't usually have fresh celery, but 1/2 cup of chopped celery could be used instead of the flakes and 1/4 tsp fresh ground pepper instead of the peppercorns. Add an hour to the cooking time if you need to roast fresh beets.

• Total Time: 55 mins
• Prep Time: 25 mins
• Cook Time: 30 mins

Ingredients:

Servings: 4

• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1 medium onion , chopped
• 1 -2 garlic clove , cut in half
• 2 cups diced potatoes , about 1 lb
• 2 cups diced roasted beets , about 1 lb
• 1 tablespoon dried celery flakes
• ½ teaspoon dried thyme
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1 bay leaf
• 2 -3 black peppercorns
• 3 -4 cups low sodium chicken broth
• 1 (12 ounce) can evaporated milk

Directions:

1. Melt the butter in a medium saucepan, and add the onions and garlic clove. Saute until the onions are transparent, but not browned.
2. Add all the remaining ingredients and enough broth to cover by about 1/2 inch, except for the evaporated milk.
3. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer, covered, for about 25 minutes, or until all the veggies are quite soft. Stir from time to time.
4. Remove from heat and fish out the bay leaf.
5. Puree with a immersion blender (or in a regular blender in batches).
6. Add the milk and more broth, if needed, and return to the stove until just heated through.
7. Note: The amount of broth will depend a bit on the exact amount of veggies and how thick you like your soup. Also, you will need to add broth or water, most likely, when reheating the next day. This is nice with a garnish of plain yogurt or sour cream.

Reviews

[Dreamer in Ontario]

I loved this soup! The only changes I made were substituting fresh celery that I diced and sauteed along with the onions since I didn't have dried celery flakes and a few grindings of pepper in place of peppercorns. Thanks for sharing. Made for PRMR Tag.