Roasted Sweet Potato and Carrot Soup

Ingredients You’ll Need

What I love most about this soup is that it’s a pantry recipe. The veggies are long storing, so I don’t have to worry about quick spoilage. Dry red lentils seem to last forever and if you don’t have cream on hand, coconut milk makes a good stand-in. Here’s what you’ll need to whip up this soup (see recipe card for details). 

• Sweet Potatoes: look for garnet red sweet potatoes. These are the variety with purplish orange skin and orange flesh. Sweet potato provides a natural sweetness to the soup and is a perfect color partner with carrots and red lentils. They help create a creamy-thick texture when blended. 
• Carrots: look for orange carrots, not the heirloom rainbow variety, since orange will complement the lentils and sweet potato color. There’s no need to peel the carrots since we’re pureeing the soup (one less thing)!
• Garlic: garlic will roast alongside the sweet potatoes and carrots with just enough time to turn the cloves into a soft, creamy consistency. Roasting the garlic offers a rich, sweet, yet mellow depth of flavor, enhancing the overall flavor of the soup. 
• Onions: an essential flavor builder; look for yellow onions. 
• Dry Red Lentils: red lentils are a protein-packed addition, lending a nutty flavor and a thickening quality when they break down during cooking. They’re another ingredient that contributes to the overall creaminess of this soup. You can find red lentils in the bulk bins for the best value and buy exactly what you need. 

• Fresh Ginger: ginger adds freshness with a hint of spicy. It enhances the complex flavors of this soup, but it isn’t loud. If you love ginger, you can add a bit more! Best of all, there’s no need to peel the ginger. Grate it on a Microplane and add it to the soup. 
• Fresh Rosemary: you’ll need about a 4-inch sprig of fresh. Fresh has a stronger/fresher flavor than dried. Unless you’re growing rosemary, you’ll have leftovers, so make these Roasted Rosemary Cashews. Like ginger, rosemary is a flavor builder. Although it’s typically a loud herb, it’s not overpowering in this soup. It gets puréed in the soup so there are no stray rosemary leaves to overwhelm one bite. 
• Vegetable Broth: this is the foundational ingredient that ties all the flavors together. Use a high-quality veggie stock. I like Better Than Bouillion Veggie Broth because it’s organic and concentrated, economical, and the glass container is recyclable (no cartons to toss). 
• Heavy Cream: just half a cup adds richness and takes this soup’s texture over the top. To make this sweet potato and carrot soup without cream, substitute with full-fat coconut milk or unsweetened Homemade Cashew Milk. 
• Lemon Juice: balances flavors and adds freshness by adding a touch of acidity. I like to serve lemon wedges alongside the soup in case anyone wants an extra squeeze.

How to Purée Soup

There are a couple of kitchen tools you can use to purée soup. For this soup, I use an immersion blender for a quick purée right in the soup pot and easy cleanup. 

• Immersion Blender: also called a stick blender, this is a handy tool when you want to purée soups right in the soup pot. It’s powerful, easily creating emulsions and breaking down soft veggies. It’s useful for making sauces, dressing, homemade mayonnaise, and more. I use one similar to this Vitamix Immersion Blender. 

• High-Speed Blender: useful for puréeing soups, making smoothies, dips, dressings, and more. They’re designed to work efficiently and to create an ultra-smooth, velvety texture. I usually use a blender when puréeing a portion of soup. However, it can also be used to purée an entire batch of soup. The quantity of this recipe exceeds the blending capacity of my blender, so if a blender is used, it needs to be blended in batches. I use and recommend a Vitamix High Speed Blender (12 years of blending and counting!). 

What to Serve with Sweet Potato Carrot Soup

This sweet potato carrot ginger soup is hearty enough on its own with a slice of crusty bread, but to round out the meal, share it with a seasonal salad and croutons. Here are a few ideas: