10 Minute, You’d Never Believe it’s Vegan, Broccoli/Kale “Cheese” Soup [Instant Pot option]

Truth be told, this soup can be made in 5 minutes if you have broccoli and the optional quinoa already cooked and ready to go. You need a high-power blender to really get it made quickly, but it with a little advance prep it can be made quickly in virtually any blender. This soup is packed with excellent plant-based sources of protein, calcium, iron, folate, vitamin b12–nutrients that many believe you have to eat animal products to get enough of. My kids are always excited to see this meal served. Broccoli is a true superfood and one worth working into your meals any chance you get. I’ve also recently discovered it works well with Kale, which opens up even more possibilities!

I’m also including Instant Pot instructions to make it even easier!

In a perfect world, you would soak cashews, cook broccoli and the quinoa in advance. But worst case and you have done nothing, you need 20 minutes tops to cook the quinoa and broccoli while you prep the rest of the soup. But it’s great with or without the quinoa, so if it’s one of those “my kids are going to eat my arm if I don’t have something on the table in 5 minutes”, skip the quinoa and make this soup!

Soaking the cashews is necessary if you don’t have a high-speed blender, but if you don’t, what are you waiting for? I put it off WAY. TOO. LONG.  Now I use my Blendtec and Twister jar for virtually every meal. I am at 8000 total blends in just over 3.5 years.  If you do have the Blendtec or Vitamix, just blend your cashews with your veggie broth first.  I love the Blendtec programmable buttons – dump your ingredients in, push a button and keep moving on your prep while the blender does it’s thing and shuts off all on it’s own!

If you do choose to soak, you can speed the soaking process by microwaving about 3/4 cup of the broth in a glass bowl or measuring cup for 1 minute and then adding the cashews. Cashews soften very quickly in hot liquid–I’d say you’d be good to go in 15-20 minutes.

But to skip the soaking altogether, I’ll blend the cashews and broth while I gather the other ingredients and get the broccoli cooking. While not totally smooth, those cashews are now in much smaller pieces that are going to soften really quickly. Then I add the seasonings and nutritional yeast to the blender and blend a second time, or if you want the blender to heat this soup, just turn it to the hot setting and let it run for the full three minutes.  Your soup will be steaming in no time and without any extra dishes! Once the soup is well-blended, simply pulse in the cooked broccoli to desired consistency and stir in the quinoa.

Make sure you stop cooking your broccoli when it is just tender and still bright green–no need to cook away extra nutrition and turn your broccoli overcooked green! Steamed broccoli is going to yield the most nutrition.

This all fits nicely in my Blendtec Wildside jar, which is one of the larger jars on the market. If you do not have a Wildside jar, simply pour some of the blended cashew mixture into a pot, pulse broccoli and and combine soup.

I usually buy my Nutritional Yeast in the bulk section at Sprouts or via Amazon.  I just checked Walmart To Go and it’s an option there. You should be able to find it most grocery stores in either the health food or spices area.

Note: if you’re using broccoli and quinoa that are cold, you’re going to want to either warm them up before adding to the soup or finish heating the soup on the stove. You don’t want to blend these for long, and chances are your soup will need some additional warming if these ingredients are cold. But if you are cooking these as you make the soup you’ll be in great shape.

Originally posted Feb 20, 2018

Print Recipe

Super Fast, You'd Never Believe it's Vegan Broccoli "Cheese" Soup

Prep Time

10 minutes

Servings

servings

Ingredients

• 2 lbs broccoli fresh or frozen, cooked
• 1-2 roasted red peppers optional
• 1 quart low-sodium vegetable broth
• 1 cup cashews preferably raw unsalted
• 3 TBSP nutritional yeast
• 1/2 tsp smoked paprika
• 1/2 tsp Chipotle Tabasco
• 1/2 tsp sea salt more as needed
• 1 cup dry quinoa cooked

Prep Time 10 minutes Servings servings Ingredients 2 lbs broccoli fresh or frozen, cooked 1-2 roasted red peppers optional 1 quart low-sodium vegetable broth 1 cup cashews preferably raw unsalted 3 TBSP nutritional yeast 1/2 tsp smoked paprika 1/2 tsp Chipotle Tabasco 1/2 tsp sea salt more as needed 1 cup dry quinoa cooked

Instructions

1. Cook your broccoli and quinoa if necessary. I like the broccoli bright green and just tender.
2. Blend cashews, red peppers and vegetable broth on high speed for 45 seconds - 1 minute. Allow to soak while adding nutritional yeast, smoked paprika, chipotle Tabasco and salt. After a few minutes soak-time, run blender again and process until smooth. Drain broccoli and add to blender. Pulse until broccoli is small and incorporated. Stir in quinoa/brown rice if using and heat soup if necessary.
3. Drain broccoli and add to blender. Pulse until broccoli is about the same size as quinoa. Add broccoli mixture to a pot with quinoa and gently heat through as needed. Add salt, pepper and additional seasoning as desired.

Instant Pot

1. Place 1 cup dry quinoa and 2 cups water in Instant Pot. To avoid overcooked broccoli, bring water to a boil on saute function, then add broccoli. Secure lid and place pressure valve to sealing. Press manual and set to one minute. When cooking is complete, quick release steam.
2. While quinoa and broccoli cook, blend cashews and vegetable broth. Add nutritional yeast, 1/2 tsp salt, paprika, and Tabasco and blend. Once mixture is smooth and creamy, some liquid can be removed to another container to make room for broccoli.
3. Add cooked broccoli to blender and pulse until it is about the same size as the quinoa. Pour soup into Instant Pot with quinoa and previously removed liquid and combine. Add additional salt, pepper or seasoning to taste and serve.