Step away from the can…
According to the Campbell website, the ingredients in their traditional Cream of Mushroom Soup includes:
WATER, MUSHROOMS, VEGETABLE OIL (CORN, COTTONSEED, CANOLA, AND/OR SOYBEAN), MODIFIED FOOD STARCH, WHEAT FLOUR, CONTAINS LESS THAN 2% OF: SALT, MONOSODIUM GLUTAMATE, SOY PROTEIN CONCENTRATE, DEHYDRATED CREAM (CREAM [MILK], SOY LECITHIN), YEAST EXTRACT, FLAVORING, DEHYDRATED GARLIC (source)
Well, the first two ingredients and the last ingredient seem benign enough. But then it gets scary… very scary indeed. Let’s take a closer inspection:
- Vegetable oils – due to the fatty acid profile, vegetable oils are inflammatory and promote weight gain. They are most likely made from GMOs (genetically modified organisms).
- Modified food starch – modifying a starch means physically, enzymatically or chemically altering it. Since modified food starches are often made with corn, this ingredient is possibly a GMO.
- Wheat flour – No thank you.
- Salt – this is, of course, highly refined table salt which lacks all the healthful properties of unrefined salt
- Monosodium Glutamate (MSG) – How about a little bit of neurotoxic MSG with your soup?
- Soy protein concentrate – soy, an anti-health food, impairs thyroid function and throws off hormone balance. It is also most likely GMO.
- Dehydrated cream – Made from the pasteurized milk of confined cows with a pinch of soy sludge… mmm, yummy. I love me some raw cream from pasture-raised cows but this “dehydrated cream” isn’t actual food in my book.
- Yeast extract – I don’t know what this is, but I certainly don’t use it in my kitchen when preparing soup.
- Flavoring – This could be almost anything, including stuff that really doesn’t belong in your stomach! The terms flavoring and natural flavors covers the deepest, darkest sins of the food industry.
This recipe uses whole foods ingredients for a deeply flavorful, rich, and creamy result. It it perfect for re-vamping your traditional Green Bean Casserole, as well.
Paleo Cream of Mushroom Soup
Author: Lauren
Serves: Makes about 2½ cups
Enjoy this soup piping hot, garnished with chopped fresh herbs. Alternatively, use it in your favorite recipe for Green Bean Casserole for a healthy make-over.
Ingredients
- ½ onion, diced
- 3 Tbs. bacon grease or ghee
- 8 oz. diced portabello or baby bella mushrooms (or mushrooms of your choice)
- ½ cup coconut milk, recommended brand available here
- 1¾ cup stock/broth of choice
- Optional: 1 tsp. arrowroot flour, to thicken the soup, available here
- Sea salt and pepper, to taste
Instructions
- In a soup pot, saute the onion in the ghee over medium heat until starting to caramelized, about 7 minutes, stirring frequently. Add the mushrooms and sauté until golden and softened, about 5 minutes.
- Add in the coconut milk and 1½ cups of broth (carefully, it will splatter). Bring to a boil, then cover and simmer over low head for about 15 minutes, until mushrooms are soft.
- Puree using an immersion blender or a standing blender. Add an additional ¼ cup of broth if desired to thin the soup.
- If a very thick soup is desired (such as for a Green Bean Casserole), combine 1 tsp. arrowroot powder with 1 tbs. of water. Place the pureed soup back in the soup pan over medium heat, and whisk in this slurry. Cook for a minute or two until thickened.
- Season soup with salt and pepper.
Would this recipe hold up if made in larger quantities and frozen for later use like in casseroles, gravies etc. Please advise. I have many autoimmune diseases and do not like to spend a lot of time in the kitchen. Looking for ways to make my time in the kitchen prepping minimal.
I would also like to know how this could be kept if made in larger quantities!
Yep, you can absolutely double the recipe and it freezes well.
Lauren, thank you, thank you for this fabulous recipe. I especially loved it in the green bean casserole!
Lauren, first of all I love your website. You have a lot of great information and recipes. I appreciate your work. I just wanted to comment about yeast extract: I read that it is one of the many names that MSG hides under. Interestingly enough if we get wise that something shouldn’t be ingested, the food industry is allowed to call it something else!!
Thanks! This is a favorite soup & your recipes are always so healthy.
I can’t help but wonder why the recipe calls for three tablespoons of bacon grease. That’s a total of 15 grams of saturated fat. It isn’t a better choice than vegetable oils.
http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/fats-and-oils/7186/2
How is this a healthy ingredient?
Great question! I discuss the importance/quality/health benefits of various fats in this two posts: 10 Reasons Why Low Fat is Not High Nutrition and 10 Reasons to Bring Back Lard.
Lauren, thank you for a dairy-free cream of mushroom soup recipe! I’m looking forward to trying it in the coming weeks and curious about how the mushroom and coconut flavors will pair and what my family may say about it ????
I just wanted to mention this book I read a few years back in search for a solution to my husband’s GI issues. It’s called “Was It Something You Ate?” by John Emsley and Peter Fell. It was published by Oxford UP in 1999. They say that yeast extract contains free glutamate that converts to MSG inside our bodies. I guess, that’s the food industry’s way of enhancing flavor and still being able to say the product is “MSG-free”.
This soup is great. I am using it for our green bean casserole. Fantastic! Thank you!!!
Hello! I love this recipe, but am not a big fan of coconut milk. Could I use almonf or cashew milk in place of the coconut milk? Thank you! I have been trying g to find a recipe like this.
The canned coconut milk works because it has a higher fat content. You could try with a different milk, then taste and add an additional dollop of ghee to enrich the soup if necessary.
This looks yummy! I don’t have any bacon or ghee in the house, do you think I could use coconut oil as the fat?
I would also like to know if you can use coconut oil instead of ghee or bacon fat.
Would tapioca flour/starch work to thicken the soup instead? If so, his much should I use?
how*