Creamy Potato Soup

Over the past few years I have fallen in love with making soup.  There is nothing better on a cold winter day then having a simmering pot of soup on your stovetop.  The other reason I love soup so much is because most are incredibly easy to make and equally impossible to screw up. 
This recipe came about on a cold winter day when I craved something warm and comforting.  I melded a handful of different recipes together and also added some inspiration of my own. Between the fresh produce I usually have on hand and the typical ingredients that are in my pantry I was able to whip this soup up without needing to step foot out into the cold winter.


Ingredients

The greatest part about this recipe is that it ends with blending all of the ingredients, this means you don’t need to worry about finely chopping ANY of the ingredients!

5 Russet Potatoes-peeled and chopped in 1 inch chunks
1 cup baby carrots (any type of carrots would be fine, I always have baby carrots on hand)
2 stalks of celery
2 garlic cloves
3 teaspoons seasoned salt
8 cups water or stock-for this recipe I used up the 1 cup of stock I had left and then used 7 cups of cold tap water
3 Tablespoons Earth Balance Spread
2 Tablespoons gluten free flour blend
1/2 cup of dairy free milk (I used Unsweetened Original Almond Milk)
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions
Bring your water or stock to a rolling boil preferably in stock pot.  When a full boil is reached add your carrots, celery, garlic, and seasoned salt. The glory of a blended soup is that these vegetables only need to be roughly chopped.  Let this simmer for 15 minutes and then add your potatoes. Continue to boil the soup until the potatoes are tender. This took me about 15 minutes. The potatoes need to be cooked evenly for flavor so keep those in equal sizes all about 1 inch chunks. 

While the soup is cooking take a sauté pan and turn on medium heat.  Melt the butter and allow it to come to a sizzle.  Then add your flour and stir until it is well blended. Allow this to come to a slow simmer and continue to cook about 1 minute.  After 1 minute slowly add the milk stirring constantly. Turn down heat to low and set aside.  You have now successfully made a dairy-free rue! 

When your potatoes are done take out 1 cup of the broth and save for your thickening agent.  The rest of the soup will be blended.  If you have an immersion blender (you lucky chef you!) blend up your soup until it is the consistency that you like.  I have a counter top blender so I blended the soup in two batches.  I enjoy my soup very creamy so I blended all ingredients up, leaving no chunks.

When the soup is blended add it back into your stock pot and turn the heat to a low-medium temperature.  Take your rue and slowly add the one cup of reserved liquid to the sauté pan stirring constantly. Take this and whisk it into your soup.  Allow the soup to simmer for 8-10 minutes, add salt and pepper as you need, and then enjoy!