This potato soup recipe is on a ton of food blogs and I hesitated to post it here since it’s so readily available. But I did veer a little bit from many of the recipes that I saw and I had a few notes to make so I thought I might as well add it to my collection.
Some blogs attribute this recipe to Paula Deen. I saw one blogger that credited the January/February 2008 issue of Paula’s magazine Cooking With Paula Deen. While it may have well been in the magazine, I think this recipe has probably been around much longer than that. I remember my former roommate’s sister making a similar recipe and there was also a variation of this that popped up at Weight Watchers meeting many moons ago.
There was a time I would have side eyed using frozen hash browns and cream of chicken soup but I’ll take any short cut I can get these days. And as awesome as my electric potato peeler is, I didn’t miss peeling potatoes to make this.
I used low sodium chicken broth and reduced fat (not fat free) cream cheese but you use your choice. This dish would make a great “gift” if you are taking a meal to someone. Just pair it up with a pan of rolls and you’ve got a yummy meal! See my notes at the end of the post for some tips and tricks.
Slow Cooker Potato Soup
1 32 oz bag of diced hash brown frozen potatoes (sometimes call Southern style)
1 32 oz carton of chicken broth
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 8oz package of cream cheese (softened)
Optional toppings: shredded cheese, bacon pieces, chopped green onion
Combine all ingredients except cream cheese and toppings in slow cooker. Cook on low for 6 to 8 hours. Add the cream cheese and continue to cook for another 30 minutes. Stir well until soup is smooth. Ladle up into blows and add your choice of toppings. Serve with rolls or crusty bread. Homemade Yeast Rolls would be awesome with it!
Notes: I put the potatoes in frozen and they were basically two big lumps. Although it’s a rule not to take the lid of the slow cooker while it’s cooking, I took the lid off about an hour in and gave it a stir.
I also switched my slow cooker to Warm after about 4 hours because the potatoes were falling apart and I like a little bit more chunk to my potato soup. I switched it back up to low about 30 minutes before I added the cream cheese.
Maybe it was because I didn’t soften my cream cheese enough but I thought it took longer than 30 minutes for it to melt up. I also stirred several times while it was melting.
This soup reheats well and was even better the next day!
If you don’t like chicken, you could use vegetable broth and cream of celery soup. Someone asked if tastes chicken-y. It didn’t to me. My husband doesn’t eat chicken very much and he liked the soup.
Let me know if you try this easy Slow Cooker Potato Soup!
From the heart and from the holler,
Minda
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