Creamy Leek and Potato Soup
A smooth, comforting soup of leeks and potatoes simmered in chicken stock, finished with cream for a velvety bowl.
- Total
- 35 min
- Prep 15 · Cook 20
- Serves
- 1
- Difficulty
- Easy
You'll practice: Sweating · Simmering
- Savory
- Creamy
- Pressure cooker
Instructions
-
Trim the leeks, halve them lengthwise, and slice into 1 cm pieces. Rinse well in a bowl of cold water to remove grit, then drain. Peel the potatoes and cut into 3 cm chunks.
~10 min
Rinsing sliced leeks lets grit sink to the bottom, keeping the soup clean.
Leeks hold a lot of grit between their layers; slicing and rinsing them in a bowl of water lets the dirt sink so the soup stays clean.
-
Set the pressure cooker to the sauté setting. Add 1 tbsp olive oil, then the leeks and 0.5 tsp salt. Cook, stirring, until the leeks are soft and translucent, about 6 minutes.
~6 min
Sweating leeks in salted oil softens them without browning, building a sweet base.
Sweating Cook leeks gently in fat with salt until translucent, not browned. If they color, your heat is too high.
-
Add the potatoes, 900 ml chicken stock, and 0.25 tsp black pepper. Lock the lid and cook on high pressure for 8 minutes, then release the pressure naturally for 5 minutes before opening.
~13 min
Pressure cooking gelatinizes potato starch and infuses flavor fast without boiling off liquid.
Simmering Cook potatoes until a spoon crushes them easily. Underdone is fixable; overcooked potatoes turn gluey when blended.
-
Open the cooker and check that the potatoes are tender enough to crush easily with a spoon. If still firm, lock the lid and cook on high pressure for 2 more minutes.
~2 min
Checking doneness lets you extend cooking only if needed, avoiding gluey overcooked potatoes.
-
Blend the soup until smooth with an immersion blender, or in a countertop blender in 2 batches, blending each batch for about 2 minutes. Stir in 120 ml cream and the remaining 0.5 tsp salt and 0.25 tsp black pepper. Taste and adjust seasoning.
~4 min
Blending shears fibers into a smooth texture, while cream adds richness and salt balances flavor.
For a silkier texture, push the blended soup through a fine sieve before adding the cream.