Vegetarian Black Bean Soup

When you serve this vegetarian black bean soup for dinner your bowl will be empty before you know it. This soup has a perfectly well rounded consistency with enough ingredients to keep things interesting but just the right amount to make it a simple soup to prepare.

Your family will thank you for this satisfying, body warming meal. If you have kids who don’t like their veggies, or you're having trouble getting in as many servings as you need yourself, soup is one of the easiest ways to hide veggies amongst other yummy flavors.

Vegetarian black bean soup is also a very versatile dish. Serve it for lunch or dinner. Top it with sour cream, chives, tomatoes, cheese, cilantro or avocado! Dunk some crispy tortilla chips in it or a crunchy piece of bread. It’s just a great recipe that you can make regularly and keep in the fridge for days when you get home late. The fiber and nutrients in black beans improve overall health. Everything from your heart to your digestive tract benefits from this meal so go grab a pot and let’s get started!

Vegetarian Black Bean Soup

Ingredients

4 cups pre-cooked black beans (or 2 cans rinsed and drained)
8 cups of vegetable stock (2 quarts)
4 carrots shredded
1 large red onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
Canola or grapeseed oil (3 tbsp)
Zest from 1 lime or lemon
Juice from 1 lime or lemon
1 large tomato, chopped (1 can of diced will due as substitute)
Spices: cumin (1 tbsp), chili powder (1 tbsp), salt and pepper to taste
Optional garnish: sour cream, hot sauce, cheddar cheese, cilantro

Directions

Heat large soup pot over med-high flame for 2 minutes
Add oil followed by onions and spices including garlic
Once onions are translucent add carrots, tomato and beans
Pour stock over vegetables and bring to boil
Turn down to low heat and let simmer for 15-30 minutes
Turn off heat, add zest and juice from citrus
Pulse an immersion blender to smooth out some of the soup (you can also wait until the soup cools more and use a food processor or counter blender)
Taste and adjust seasoning if necessary, top with garnish and serve!

As you can see, vegetarian black bean soup is easy to make and since it’s a one-pot meal it will make clean up even easier. I hope you enjoy this soup and feel free to throw in extras to change it up a bit. I’ve tried this recipe with adding corn, spinach and some jalapeno pepper to turn up the heat! For something a little exotic try juicing and zesting a small orange instead of the lime or lemon. All these ingredients can change the character of the soup a little and all the variations taste great! Needless to say the basic soup recipe can stand alone and is one of my favorite reliable autumn meals.