Vegetarian Baked Potato Soup- Crock Pot Challenge #6

*This is the 6th of of 10 Crock Pot recipes I am trying in January and February as part of the Peanut Butter Fingers Blog Crock Pot Challenge*

Here are the first 5 recipe links!

Crock Pot Hearty Italian Vegetable Soup

Vegetarian Italian Quinoa Stuffed Peppers

No Pre-Boil Mac & Cheese

Crock Pot Spicy Asian Shrimp Soup

Crock Pot Black Bean Enchilada Stack

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Don’t you love baked potato soup?  It’s thick and creamy and just screams yummy comfort food.  Luckily making it in the Crock Pot is super easy and can be adapted to suit your taste.  This is a recipe I’ve modified over time and I really enjoy it.  I am not a big fan of buying and using heavy cream at home, so I use low fat cream cheese as a sub to the full calorie heavy cream.  You use an immersion blender to pull the whole delicious soup together.

Enjoy!

Vegetarian Baked Potato Soup

Ingredients:

2-3 pounds russet potatoes cut in cubes

2 celery stalks sliced

1 medium onion chopped

5 garlic cloves minced

1 tablespoon seasoned salt

1 teaspoon dried thyme

32 oz vegetarian broth

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6-8 oz of low fat cream cheese

2 tablespoons or butter or margarine

1/4 cup low fat sour cream

salt/ pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Add potatoes, celery, onion, garlic, season salt, and thyme to crock pot.  Cover with the veggie broth.  Make sure all the ingredients are covered and add a small amount of water if they are not.

2. Cook on low for 8-9 hours or high for 4-5 hours or until the potatoes are tender.

3. Use immersion blender to puree soup.  You can also put it in a conventional blender if you do not have an immersion blender.  I like to leave some potato chunks.

4.  Cut up cream cheese into small pieces and add to soup.  Also add the butter & sour cream.  Stir the soup until this all starts to melt.  Cover the soup and let sit under high heat for 15 minutes or until all the cream cheese is melted into soup.

5. Garnish with shredded cheese, onions, chives or EVEN BACON (for the meat loving husband!)

Tags: Baked Potato Soup, Crock Pot Challenge, Vegetarian Recipes