The Basic Soup Formula: Cooking Soups & Stews Without a Recipe

Soups and gravies are probably the easiest to learn to cook from scratch and without a recipe. (If you’re new to cooking without instructions, check out my post on the general principles of learning to cook without a recipe.) I’ve developed a basic soup formula that can be used to create everything from creamy tomato soup to hearty lentil soup and chili, depending on what you have on hand.

Soups satisfied my savory comfort food cravings throughout my pregnancy last winter, so I got quite good at making them. I made lots of different kinds of soups, depending on what I had on hand. My toddler also just went through a stage where soup was her favorite food and even requested it for breakfast, so my soups are also kid-approved!

Basic Soup Formula

1. I start most of my soups by sautéing onions, carrots, and garlic, sometimes adding celery, too (I don’t always have it on hand because I’m extra picky about the quality of my celery.) Note: While these are my family’s favorites—they also keep well and form the classic base used in French cooking—feel free to use any veggies you like!
2. Then, I add spices during the last minute or two of sautéing – this is called blooming (cooking spices till fragrant in preheated fat) and it intensifies the flavors of the spices. This does not work for herbs though, I save them till last so I don’t simmer their flavors to nothingness.
3. Lastly, pour in some liquid (usually vegetable stock) and whatever else you would like in the soup, and let it simmer till the ingredients in your soup are cooked.
4. Season with salt, pepper, and herbs to taste (if spices need adjustment, that’s okay too). When the flavor is right, turn off the heat, let cool, and enjoy!

So that’s the basic template, and you can adapt it to create a variety of different soups and stews.

Note: If you are making a meat stew with chunks of meat, it’s usually best to sauté the meat too, just to cook the outside, which develops the flavor and locks in the juices. Then it cooks the rest of the way while the soup simmers. If using ground meat, sauté till cooked all the way through to lock in flavor.

How Long to Cook Soup on the Stove?

Because you are cooking without a strict recipe, you might wonder exactly how long to let your pot simmer. As a general rule, a pot of homemade soup needs to sit on the stove for between 20 minutes (veggies) and 60 minutes (meats).

Here is a quick breakdown based on what you throw into the pot:

• Quick Veggie, Lentil, canned Bean & Broth Soups: 20–30 minutes (just long enough to get your vegetables fork-tender).
• Hearty Split-pea, dried Bean Soups, and scratch Chilis: 45–60 minutes
• Raw Meat or Chicken Soups: 45–60 minutes (this ensures your meat cooks all the way through and stays tender).

Variations

Tomato soup

This soup is the fastest to make up. One morning, when my two-year-old requested soup for breakfast, I had it done in 10 minutes flat.

1. Sauté onions, garlic, and carrots if desired. If you’re using fresh tomatoes, tomato paste, or whole canned tomatoes, you can add them at this point.
2. For broth, I usually use tomato juice (my favorite option!); occasionally, I’ll use a generic V8-type juice. You can also use veggie stock if you have already added your tomato flavor in the first step.
3. I like to add a whole can of white beans and blend them in with my immersion blender; it makes the tomato “broth” thicker, creamier, and balances out the acidity of the tomato plus it adds protein. If you want your soup to be smooth, it helps to have an immersion blender. Otherwise, you can blend it in a regular blender; transferring to a blender and back to a soup pot. It’s just more dishes and dedication than I have time for with a toddler. You could also leave the veggies chopped like a vegetable soup; this is my husband’s favorite way to have it. If you like, you can even turn this into a minestrone by adding more veggies and noodles, see below.
4. Season to taste. I like to use a little soy sauce, Brewer’s yeast – or better yet, nutritional yeast flakes, and Italian seasoning.

How to Thicken and Cream Soup Without a Blender

If you want a thick creamy soup base but you don’t have an immersion blender—or want to deal with the extra dishes of a traditional countertop blender—you can easily create a rich texture using a few old-fashioned tricks:

• The Potato Masher Method (easiest): Simply use a hand potato masher right inside your cooking pot to crush a portion of your cooked vegetables or white beans to create a thicker smoother soup.
• The Back-of-the-Spoon Trick: You can just press some softer vegetables against the inside wall of your soup pot with your spoon to mash them manually. A wooden spoon works well for this.
• Use a Classic Roux: Whisk equal parts flour and butter (or oil) in your pan for one minute right after sautéing your onions and garlic, before you pour in your liquid. This builds a naturally thick, rich base from the very start.

Minestrone

Good way to use up leftover tomato soup, if that’s what you’re doing skip to step 3.

1. Sauté onions, carrots, garlic, and celery.
2. Make a tomato-flavored broth by using anything tomato including fresh tomatoes, paste, sauce, juice or V8. This can be bulked up by adding vegetable stock or water. Bring to a simmer so the flavors can meld.
3. Add any veggies you are using to the simmering tomato base. If using potatoes, simmer until they’re fork-tender. If using noodles, bring the soup to a boil and cook with the noodles for the amount of time listed on the pasta box. Tip: if using mixed veggies, add them towards the end so they don’t get too soft, maybe after noodles are done as you turn off the heat so they can cool the broth as they thaw (at my house we prefer our veggies to retain a little of their crisp texture).
4. Season with herbs plus salt and pepper to taste, and enjoy

Chili

Yes, chili is made the same way as soup

1. Sauté onions, carrots, and garlic.
2. Add a tomato flavoring option (anything tomato will work including leftover tomato soup). Add in your spices and cook till fragrant. I like to add a little cumin, red pepper flakes, or paprika, some soy sauce (between 1 and 2 teaspoons), and a little salt (sometimes I sneak in a shake or two of chili powder, but my husband doesn’t really like the flavor of chili powder). If using canned beans you can add bell peppers, or any softer vegetables at this step too.
3. Add veggie stock and beans, if using canned beans, cook until chili is warm and flavors are blended, if using dried beans, boil until baked down or fork tender, which can vary widely between large and small beans, anywhere from 45-120 minutes.
4. Season to taste and enjoy

My best chili tips

I soak my beans overnight, if I’m not going to use them right away, I freeze them, and when I get them out, I rinse them in hot water to thaw before making this chili in my instant pot, which makes it a fair bit faster. I use the sauté function for steps 1 and 2, then hit cancel whenever I am done with step 2. Then I add my beans (usually pinto) and cook on high pressure for 45 minutes.

Lentil soup

Shout out to one of my favorite food blogs, Cookie and Kate and the best lentil soup recipe, which caused me to fall in love with lentils. However, it is possible to make a variation without a recipe and using whatever you may have on hand. This soup has become my default if I have unexpected company or a last-minute potluck meal. Vegan and gluten-free, it still has plenty of protein from the lentils, which makes it filling.

1. Sauté onions, carrots, and garlic
2. Add tomatoes or canned tomatoes, if using, and spices (I use cumin, curry powder, and, for extra savoriness, soy sauce).
3. Add water or veggie stock and remaining veggies (some of my favorite add-ins have been mushrooms, bok choy, and sweet peppers), add lentils, and simmer until the lentils reach desired tenderness.
4. Season to taste and enjoy.

Final Thoughts on Spices

Let me close with a couple of tips about spices I recently discovered. First, I used to use a fair amount of turmeric in my soups, especially the vegetable ones, because, well, turmeric is good for you (they say it’s anti-inflammatory); however, it has quite the distinctive (bitter) taste, and my soups often ended up as uneaten leftovers when I overdid it. So, I started putting less, and then I discovered that it was even better when I lightly used curry powder, which happens to be a mix of spices including turmeric. The other thing I discovered was that I love celery salt, which is celery seed and salt, so I just started buying celery seed and adding it to literally all my soups.

“Now Jacob cooked a stew; and Esau came in from the field, and he was weary. And Esau said to Jacob, ‘Please feed me with that same red stew, for I am weary.’ Therefore his name was called Edom. But Jacob said, ‘Sell me your birthright as of this day.’ And Esau said, ‘Look, I am about to die; so what is this birthright to me?’ Then Jacob said, ‘Swear to me as of this day.’ So he swore to him, and sold his birthright to Jacob.  And Jacob gave Esau bread and stew of lentils; then he ate and drank, arose, and went his way. Thus Esau despised his birthright.”

Genesis 25:29-34 NKJV