Creamy Leek and Potato Soup (with or without cream!)

Leek and Potato Soup is hard to beat.  A doddle to make, won't break the bank and truly delicious!  In this version simplicity rules, with few ingredients and even fewer cooking steps.  The ultimate in thrifty, fuss-free cooking.  

This classic is popular on both sides of the Channel.  In France you will generally find it called Potage Bonne Femme or Potage Parmentier, and the famous Vichyssoise is simply a cold version of the soup.   It's a great soup for when cooking on a tight budget.

Jump to:

• 🧾Ingredients
• 🍽 Equipment
• 🔪 How to make Leek and Potato Soup
• 💭 More Ideas for Potato and Leek Soup
• 👨🏻‍🍳 Top tips
• 📋 Recipe Card

🧾Ingredients

• leeks
• potatoes
• stock or water
• salt and pepper
• mace (optional)
• cream, milk or butter (optional)

The recipe card further down this post has details of quantities.

Let's take a look at some of the ingredients in more detail.

Leeks

I use just leeks for this Leek and Potato Soup recipe, with no onion.  I find that onions can sometimes overwhelm the more delicate flavours of the leeks.   And, of course, it means one less ingredient to find!   Recipes often state that just the white part of the leeks should be used. This does seem to be such a waste, though, as much of the green part is tasty too. I prefer to include the paler green part of the leeks, as well as the white.  This give a lovely faint green colouring to the soup (in a good way!).

To fry the leeks or not to fry?

No cooking (frying) of the leeks in butter or oil is needed in this recipe. I used to cook the leeks in butter or oil as a first step until reading Mastering the Art of French Cooking Volume 1 by Simone Beck, Louisette Bertholle and Julia Child, in which all the potatoes and leeks are cooked by simply boiling together. I have followed this method ever since. So easy! At one time, I thought that Julia Child and her fellow authors were out on their own with this method. However, I recently come across the excellent French cooking book La Bonne Cuisine (published 1929), which gives a recipe for Potage Poireaux et Pommes de Terre that also uses this simple technique of boiling the leeks and potatoes together.

There does seem to be some debate as to whether or not you will lose some flavour if the leeks are simply boiled. Felicity Cloake in her fantastic series How to Cook the Perfect... sides with Jane Grigson, whose opinion in the Vegetable Book is that it is important to saute leeks in butter so that "the special flavour" is not lost. We have not yet done a blind taste at home to check this out. I'm sticking with the boil method in the meantime. In his book New British Classics, the chef, Gary Rhodes, goes down another route entirely for his version of Leek and Potato Soup. He does not cook the leeks in butter or oil. Instead Gary Rhodes adds onion as an ingredient, and the onion is cooked in butter together with the potatoes before the stock is added and then the leeks.

As an aside, New British Classics is a wonderful book on British cooking. It contains many traditional dishes and a lot of information on British cooking generally including its history.

Potatoes

Be sure to use floury rather than waxy potatoes so that your Leek and Potato Soup does not end up a gloopy, unappetising mass.   

So what are floury (or mealy) potatoes?  Harold McGee in his wonderful tome McGee on Food and Cooking explains that they have more dry starch in their cells than waxy potatoes.  This concentration of starch results in the cells of floury potatoes swelling up and separating from each other when cooked.  This give that fluffy texture to the potatoes which is needed to make a good soup.

Examples of floury potato varieties you can use are:  Desiree, Estima, King Edward and Maris Piper.  You should also be fine using potatoes that are described as "all rounders", such as Rooster. This potato loving website gives more information on floury potatoes and potato varieties in general.

Stock or Water

I think the Leek and Potato Soup tastes fantastic with just water added. Vegetable or meat stock will, of course, give extra depth of flavours. My favourite to use is chicken stock.

Mace

We always had mace in the larder when I was growing up. When I flick through the pages of of the older British cookery books I have, mace seems to crop up fairly frequently as a spice that is added to savoury dishes. Is it is just me or does it tend to be used less often now in British cooking? Add a pinch of mace for a traditional flavour.

Cream, Milk or Butter

So many choices! Although not essential for a great tasting soup, adding some form of dairy product does really bring this Leek and Potato Soup to another level. My mother would always add a dollop of milk towards the end of the cooking time. This gives an extra smoothness to the soup. For richness, add a dash of double cream before serving. You must be careful not to overdo the double cream as it can give a "heavy" feel to the soup. My favourite at the moment, however, is soured cream. The Hungarian influence of my husband means that I now almost always have soured cream in the fridge. Soured cream gives a wonderful tangy freshness to the soup, as well as its rich creaminess. Add a spoonful to each bowl of soup before serving.

And if cream is not your thing, take a look at the More Ideas section for how to make an easy no-cream version of this soup that is creamy without the cream!

🍽 Equipment

• large saucepan
• cutting board
• knife or peeler for peeling vegetables
• knife for cutting vegetables 
• hand blender
• wooden spoon (or other spoon for stirring)
• soup ladle (optional)

🔪 How to make Leek and Potato Soup

💭 More Ideas for Potato and Leek Soup

• Add a topping for extra flavour such as fried bacon pieces, grated cheese or croutons
• For a more substantial meal, place a tablespoonful or two of cooked rice into the serving bowls before pouring on the hot soup. Add a generous knob of butter. Perfect winter comfort food!
• For a no-cream but magically creamy, rich soup nonetheless, try this great idea from La Bonne Cuisine. Whisk a couple of egg yolks into half a glass of milk. Make sure that the egg yolks are thoroughly whisked into the milk. After the soup has been blended and seasoned, take it off the heat. Pour the milk and egg mixture into the soup, stirring all the time. The soup will transform into a deliciously creamy soup.

📋 Recipe Card