Creamy Carrot Soup: The Ultimate Cozy Sunshine Bowl

Creamy Carrot Soup: The Ultimate Cozy Sunshine Bowl

Yield: 6

This creamy plant-based carrot soup is a bowl of sunshine! Blended with warming spices and coconut milk, it’s nutritious, delicious, and soul-soothing.

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Ingredients

• 2tbs olive oil
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• 1tbs Thai red curry paste
• 1.1kg carrots, sliced
• 1l vegetable stock
• ⅓ peanut butter
• 1 cup canned coconut milk
• Sea salt and freshly ground pepper

Serving

• Peanuts, crushed

Instructions

1. Add olive oil and chopped onion to a pot on medium heat and sauté until the onions are softened.
2. Add the crushed garlic and Thai red curry paste and sauté briefly to toast the spices.
3. Add the sliced carrots and toss them up with the onions.
4. Add vegetable stock and bring to a boil. Turn down the heat, cover the pot and let it simmer until the carrots are soft and cooked, about 25 minutes.
5. Now add the peanut butter and stir until well mixed. Remove the soup from the heat and blend until smooth.
6. Add the coconut milk and stir.
7. Add salt and pepper to taste
8. Serve in bowls topped with the crushed peanuts

Nutrition Information:

Yield: 6 Serving Size: 1
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 210Total Fat: 14gSaturated Fat: 8gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 5gCholesterol: 0mgSodium: 698mgCarbohydrates: 21gFiber: 6gSugar: 8gProtein: 3g

A warm bowl with a long backstory: soup, carrots, and why they’re perfect together

Soup is likely one of humanity’s oldest comfort foods. Long before metal pots, early cooks heated stones in a fire and dropped them into water-filled pits or skin bags to simmer grains, roots, and herbs. The very word “soup” traces to the medieval practice of sopping—soaking bread in broth. From French potage to Chinese congee, from Middle Eastern lentil soups to Italian minestrone, every cuisine has a version: a humble technique that turns simple ingredients into something greater than the sum of its parts.

Carrots entered the story later but fit the soup’s mission perfectly. Domesticated in Central Asia—often credited to the region around present-day Afghanistan—early carrots were purple or yellow, not orange. Over centuries, farmers selected for sweetness, tenderness, and storage. By the 16th–17th centuries, Dutch horticulturists popularised orange carrots, the colour we now think of as “classic.” (The oft-repeated tale that they bred them specifically to honour the House of Orange is charming, though historians note it’s more marketing myth than proven fact.) Today you’ll still find rainbow varieties—purple, yellow, white, and red—each bringing subtle differences in flavour and phytochemicals.

In France, puréed vegetable soups became culinary staples—think purée de carottes—and chefs like Carême and later Escoffier helped codify them. That tradition echoes in today’s creamy, plant-based carrot soups: gently sweat aromatics, bloom spices, simmer, then blend to silk. Coconut milk, a pantry hero, brings body without dairy and amplifies spice aromas.

Fun carrot facts to stir into conversation:

• WWII & night vision: Britain’s Ministry of Food leaned into carrots’ vitamin A content to explain pilots’ “night vision,” a cheeky way to mask new radar tech. The story stuck—carrots do support normal vision via beta-carotene, but they won’t grant superpowers.

• “Baby carrots” aren’t baby: Most are baby-cut—shaped from larger, misshapen carrots to reduce waste.

• Leafy tops are edible: Carrot greens taste herbaceous and slightly bitter; whizz them into pesto or chop them into soups for freshness.

Nutrition, the tasty way. Carrots are naturally sweet and low in calories, with fibre for fullness and potassium for fluid balance. Their star nutrient is beta-carotene, a precursor to vitamin A that supports normal vision, immune function, and skin health. Here’s the happy news for soup lovers: cooking and blending carrots can increase the bioavailability of carotenoids by breaking down cell walls. Adding a little fat helps your body absorb them—so the coconut milk in your creamy carrot soup isn’t just for luxury; it’s nutritionally smart.

Spices add more than flavour. Ginger brings gentle warmth; cumin and coriander offer earthy citrus notes; turmeric contributes golden colour and curcumin, which pairs well with a pinch of black pepper and some fat for better uptake. Finish with citrus to brighten, or a spoon of tahini for extra richness and calcium.

Why carrot soup works. Soups are hydrating, cosy, and adaptable—ideal for weeknights and batch cooking. Carrots’ natural pectin and fibre blend into a silky texture without cream, while their sweetness balances spice and acidity. They store brilliantly, making them a thrifty base for big-batch meals. And because carrots play well with global flavours—Moroccan(ish) with cumin and harissa, Indian(ish) with ginger and garam masala, Thai(ish) with lemongrass and lime—you can riff endlessly without changing the core method.

From Stone Age simmering to a modern blender, soup’s job hasn’t changed: turn humble produce into comfort. Carrots, with their colour, sweetness, and nutrient depth, are the perfect partner—especially when spun into a creamy, spiced, plant-based “bowl of sunshine.”