Simple Wild Garlic Soup

Wild garlic soup is one of many ways to make the most of the abundant green leaves that appear outdoors each spring. This simple recipe uses potatoes to help bulk out the broth, which is then blended and topped with the likes of wild garlic pesto for extra foraging points. 🌱💪

Recipe testing notes

• Preparation: You'll want to make sure your wild garlic has been cleaned and washed thoroughly before cooking (see recipe notes on safe foraging and preparation).
• Stringy texture: Wild garlic can be a little stringy, so it helps to remove the stems before adding to soup (since these are thicker and can make it harder to clean your blender afterwards).
• Peeling potatoes: When it comes to soup, I usually just scrub potatoes instead of peeling but it's entirely up to you. Peeling will result in a slightly smoother final consistency.

What you'll need

To create this simple wild garlic soup, you'll need:

• Wild garlic leaves (I also include some of the stems)
• Onion to create an aromatic base
• Potatoes to add bulk and texture
• Plant-based butter to keep things dairy-free
• Plant-based cream (I've gone with homemade cashew cream)

How to make wild garlic soup

See recipe notes for tips on responsible foraging and how to prepare wild garlic.

Heat the butter in a large saucepan on medium heat.

Add the chopped onion, season with salt and pepper, and cook for 5-6 minutes or until starting to soften.

Once starting to soften, add the diced potatoes and cook for another 3-4 minutes, stirring regularly.

Add the stock, bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for around 15 minutes or until the potatoes have softened.

Once the potatoes are soft, stir in the wild garlic leaves.

It may help to do this in batches and push them down into the pan each time.

Cook for a few minutes until wilted.

Once the wild garlic has wilted down, turn off the heat and blend until smooth with a hand blender.

If using cream, stir this in then adjust the seasoning to taste and serve.

Serving suggestions

This soup is nice on its own as a light meal, or with a few slices of bread to dunk and mop up your bowl at the end.

I like to top it off with an extra drizzle of cashew cream, a few blobs of delicious homemade wild garlic pesto (or regular vegan pesto), a squeeze of lemon juice, and then a sprinkling of cashew parmesan or super seed mix.

Recipe FAQ

Variations and tips for wild garlic soup

• More flavour: Ingredients such as wholegrain mustard and nutritional yeast are great for adding extra layers of flavour to vegan soups like this one (see also my recipe for leek and potato soup).
• Other veg: Feel free to add other vegetables such as carrots, celery, cabbage, or leeks.
• Herbs: I've kept this recipe pretty simple, but there'd be no harm in adding herbs such as bay, parsley, sage, or homemade Italian herb mix.
• Nettles: I haven't tried it myself (yet), but I know many foragers like to cook with stinging nettles and so you could also throw them in here. As ever, you should never eat wild food unless you're 100% sure it's safe (and in the case of nettles, be sure to wear gloves when gathering 😬).

More vegan recipe ideas

If you liked this recipe, you might also enjoy:

You can also check out my full list of vegan soup recipes.

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