Paleo Soup Recipes

There's no cream in this silky mushroom soup. Pureed potatoes give this vegan mushroom soup its creamy texture. Be sure to use Yukon Gold--russets don't provide quite the right texture.

For this easy slow-cooker split pea soup, look for raw smoky, spicy chorizo. If you can't find raw chorizo, Italian sausage or merguez makes a fine substitute.

Gazpacho is a delicious way to eat more veggies. Think of it as a vegetable smoothie. Not only does Chef José Andrés keep a pitcher of this healthy gazpacho recipe in his refrigerator all summer, it's also served at Beefsteak, his chain of vegetable-driven restaurants.

Garlic and ginger flavor the broth of this egg drop soup.

Apples add just a hint of sweetness to this velvety pumpkin soup. Try it as a delightful first course for a special meal.

Dried kelp and bonito flakes, briefly simmered, create a delicate amber broth called “first” or “primary” dashi, the basis for most clear soups in Japan. For “second” dashi, the kelp and bonito are added to a new pot of water (like a used tea bag), making a weaker stock to be used in boldly seasoned dishes like miso soup. Although instant dashi granules and bottles of concentrated dashi are timesaving substitutes, the taste is less subtle and refined than dashi made from scratch.

Inspired by Spanish pureed gazpachos, this golden-yellow one is based on an idea of Greg Parks's at the Four Columns Inn in Newfane, Vermont.

What bouillabaisse is to Provence, cioppino is to San Francisco. The principle behind both fish stews is much the same: simmer the catch of the day in a rich broth, grab a soup spoon and enjoy. Like many classic cioppino recipes, this calls for red wine in the broth, but feel free to substitute white. The assortment of seafood can vary as well: little clams instead of mussels, scallops in place of shrimp. Serve with sourdough bread.

This rustic dish typifies Mediterranean home cooking at its best: a full-flavored vegetable stew is topped with eggs to become a main dish. Any hot sauce you have on hand will add a nice jolt of heat, but for a complex, authentic flavor, try harissa, a chile paste from North Africa.

Homemade broths are easy to whip up with leftover bones and freeze well.

Homemade chicken broth is easy to make with this slow-cooker chicken stock recipe. With just 5 minutes of prep time, you'll have 10 cups of no-sodium-added flavorful broth to use in soups, stews, pastas and more.

This easy turkey stock adds great flavor to the gravy, but you can use chicken broth instead with good results.

The delicate flavors of cucumber and watermelon go hand in hand to create a sweet-and-savory chilled soup, perfect as a first course on a hot night.

Nothing soothes, nourishes and comforts like homemade chicken broth. Canned broth is a handy standby for quick soups, but homemade delivers maximum flavor while contributing minimal calories.

Making and freezing vegetable broth is well worth the minimal effort. While there are some commercial broths we like, nothing beats the fresh, clean flavor of homemade.

It is difficult to find a commercial fish stock, although some fish markets may offer a frozen stock. Seek out heads and bones at the fish counter of your grocery store.

Veal bones make a particularly rich, gelatinous beef stock. If you don't have them, substitute an equal amount of beef bones. The step of roasting the bones, which imparts fuller flavor, may be omitted if time is short.

Roasting tomatoes gives them an intense, sweet flavor and also makes them very easy to peel. The soup is then chilled, making a refreshing first course on a hot summer night.

Whirl grilled bell peppers, zucchini and onion in a food processor with some vine-ripened tomatoes in this smoky gazpacho-like soup. Make it a meal: Serve with Pan Bagna for a delightful warm-weather Mediterranean meal.