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This broccoli and zucchini soup is the perfect addition to your winter menu. Vegetable broth, leeks, potatoes, broccoli, and cream cheese make a rich, creamy, velvety smooth puree that is then topped with zucchini noodles, peas, and chives making for a healthy twist on an old favorite.
Soup weather is finally here, and I couldn’t be more excited! This creamy zoodle soup with added broccoli is beyond amazing! It’s creamy, velvety, and the perfect comfort food (without the guilt!).
This recipe is inspired by the traditional cream of broccoli soup, but with a twist. Zucchini noodles are added for an extra serving of vegetables, plus they’re just plain delicious! Garlic and leeks are sautéed together in olive oil then topped with broccoli, potatoes, zucchini, salt & pepper for the perfect base. Then it’s all pureed into one velvety smooth broth – the perfect base for your zoodles and peas. It’s then topped with chives for a bit of zing!
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
- Loaded with flavor, and it’s healthy!
- Creamy good: The potatoes and broccoli make a great solid base for the puree. It features a touch of cream cheese that makes it super creamy.
- Wholesome and comforting.
Equipments Needed
This is a one-pot meal! How awesome is that?! I just love one-pot meals, especially for busy weeknights. You will need a few other little kitchen gadgets to help you get your soup going, but nothing major which means no heavy cleanup!
- Large saucepan or soup pot
- Spiralizer if you want to make your Zoodles
- An immersion blender (or a food processor or regular blender)
Ingredients you will need
- olive oil– or any other oil of choice
- 1 leek, pale section only
- Garlic clove, crushed – use fresh garlic if possible
- zucchini- you may use yellow zucchini if preferred
- head broccoli- fresh or frozen broccoli
- Potato: yellow potatoes will work great.
- Vegetable stock – you may use any other stock you have on hand
- Cream cheese- use light cream cheese if you like
- Frozen peas, thaw the peas first
- Flat-leaf parsley leaves- used to serve and can be optional
- Chopped chives, to serve- this can also be optional
How To Make zucchini soup
- Prepare the zucchini: First, thoroughly wash the zucchini and trim off the ends. Cut the zucchini in half and set one half into the spiralizer to make it into zoodles. Coarsely chop the remaining zucchini half and broccoli into small bite-size pieces.
- Cut the leek and potatoes: Next, cut the pale section of the leek into thick slices. Peel and cut the potatoes roughly into cubes.
- Cook the veggies first: Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add garlic and leeks; cook stirring occasionally until slightly softened for 5 minutes. Add in the chopped zucchini, broccoli, and potatoes; cook until veggies are golden brown and begin to soften.
- Pour the vegetable stock: After the veggies are done cooking, add the vegetable stock and cook for 15 minutes until the vegetables are super tender.
- Add the cream cheese: Stir in the cream cheese and cook for 2 minutes more.
- Blend: Take the pot off the heat and using an immersion blender, carefully puree the soup.
- Keep cooking the soup: Return the soup over medium-low heat and stir in the peas and zoodles. simmer for 2-3 minutes, until zoodles begin to soften the turn off the heat.
- Serve: Ladle the soup among bowls. Garnish with parsley and chives and serve warm.
What to pair it with
While this soup is excellent on its own, you can serve it as an appetizer too, or eat it paired with a salad like this roasted beet salad, grilled chicken sandwich, or a wrap like chicken Caesar Wrap.
If you want to make it as an appetizer for a dinner party, it pairs well with my honey garlic chicken, balsamic chicken Caprese, or even my lemon chicken skewers. Serve with vibrant vegetables such as carrots or Garlic Brussels sprouts and finish off your meal with a nice light dessert like these cheesecake stuffed strawberries.
Storage Recommendations
On the off chance that you do have leftovers, I would store this soup in an airtight container and refrigerate it. It should keep for about three days (if it lasts that long!). To reheat, simply transfer the soup to a saucepan or pot on your stovetop. You can also use your microwave, but I would suggest stirring every 30 seconds, so it doesn’t start to cook around the edges of the bowl.
My favorite way to eat leftover broccoli and Zoodle Soup is cold! It makes a delicious lunch or snack straight out of the fridge on those days when you’ve got zero time to cook.
Broccoli Zucchini Potato Soup FAQs
Due to the cream cheese in the soup, I would recommend against freezing it. The cream cheese will separate and curdle as soon as you defrost it, causing a less than appealing texture for this zoodle soup recipe. That being said, you can freeze it – just expect some separation and the possibility that the texture and look will be altered upon reheating.
Absolutely! If you want to make this recipe vegan or dairy-free, simply omit the cream cheese and replace it with either vegan cream cheese or your favorite dairy-free alternative. The flavor may change slightly, but I can’t imagine it would be for the worse! You can also just leave out the cream cheese altogether.
Yes! It’s actually quite easy to turn almost any vegetable into noodles using just a knife! You can find a tutorial on how to do that here. If you don’t have time to zoodle your noodles, you can always buy pre-spiralized zoodles. They are very common now, and you can find fresh and frozen versions at your local grocery store
Sure! However, keep in mind that the cooking times will vary depending on which vegetable you decide to replace. For instance, sweet potatoes and carrot noodles tend to take a bit longer than other veggies because they need more time to soften.
More soup recipes
- Mexican Sweet Corn Soup
- Lemon and Parmesan Chicken Orzo Soup
- White Bean and Kale Soup
- Chicken Gnocchi Soup
- Easy Hamburger Soup
- Vegan Lentil Soup
If you try a recipe and you like it, leave me some feedback in the comment section below, and don’t forget to rate it! I would love it if you shared it with friends and family.
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Creamy Zucchini Noodle Broccoli Soup
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 leek, pale section only, thickly sliced
- 1 garlic clove, crushed
- 1 large zucchini, ends trimmed, half chopped, half zoodled
- 1 large head broccoli, florets, and stems coarsely chopped
- 1 large potato, peeled, coarsely chopped
- 4 cups vegetable stock
- 1/2 cup cream cheese
- 1 cup frozen peas, thawed
- Flat-leaf parsley leaves, to serve
- Chopped chives, to serve
Instructions
- Thoroughly wash the zucchini and trim off the ends. Cut the zucchini in half and set one half into the spiralizer to make it into zoodles.
- Coarsely chop the remaining zucchini half and broccoli into small bite-size pieces.
- Cut the pale section of the leek into thick slices. Peel and cut the potatoes roughly into cubes.
- Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add garlic and leeks; cook stirring occasionally until slightly soften for 5 minutes.
- Add in the chopped zucchini, broccoli, and potatoes; cook until veggies are golden brown and begin to soften.
- Pour the vegetable stock and cook for 15 minutes until vegetables are super tender.
- Stir in the cream cheese and cook for 2 minutes more. Take the pot off the heat and using an immersion blender, carefully puree the soup.
- Return the soup over medium-low heat and stir in the peas and zoodles. Simmer for 2-3 minutes, until zoodles begin to soften the turn off the heat.
- Pour the soup among bowls. Garnish with parsley and chives and serve warm.
Notes
- Serving size: one bowl or 2 cups
- Oil: any oil of choice will work
- Use fresh ingredients when possible, like fresh garlic, fresh broccoli, and fresh frozen peas.
- In place of the cream cheese, you may use Thai coconut milk
- Any broth can be used. To keep it vegetarian, use vegetable broth.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
