How to Make Potato-Leek Soup

I gave a cooking lesson last night and one of the dishes we made was a potato-leek soup. Both potatoes and leeks are in season here in the Northeast United States.

To make the potato-leek soup, we employed the basic technique used for making other soups (carrot-ginger and split pea) that I’ve previously written about.

We started by sautéing some chopped bacon in a soup pot, stirring often to prevent the bacon from burning. We didn’t need to use any oil, since the bacon gave off plenty of fat. While the bacon cooked, we chopped and washed about two pounds of Yukon gold potatoes and three leeks.

Note: I really dislike writing exact amounts, since I don’t want people to think they can’t make this soup if they have only one pound of potatoes and two leeks. Use whatever you have; the result will be better than anything from a can!

When the bacon started to crisp, we removed it to a bowl. We drained most of the fat and cooked the chopped leeks in the remainder, stirring constantly. When the leeks were soft (10 minutes), we added the potatoes and enough cold water to cover the vegetables by about an inch. We let the vegetables simmer for about 40 minutes, until the potatoes were easily pierced with a sharp knife.

After letting the mixture cool slightly (translation: we were busy making an apple crisp and sautéing a piece of fish), we used a hand-held immersion blender to purée the potatoes and leeks until they were smooth. We seasoned with sea salt, fresh ground pepper and lemon juice, plus used the bacon pieces as garnish.

Delicious.