A tasty but simple red kidney bean soup recipe using canned beans. Full of smoky Mexican style flavors, with a thick, smooth and creamy texture thanks to the richness of the pureed beans. This soup is filling enough to be a complete meal with a variety of contrasting toppings and can be easily made vegan.
White beans are very on trend these days, and I am here for that, but lately I have been thoroughly enjoying cooking with red kidney beans. They have a lot of things in common with butter beans, in that they are a little bit larger than other types of bean and they have a fantastically creamy quality to them. After making my Cheesy Kidney Bean Tacos, I knew they needed to be explored a little bit more, and so this soup was born.
This is kind of a hybrid between a taco soup (because it really comes to life when you add toppings) and refried bean soup (with the thick richness of smooth pureed beans). The beans do most of the heavy lifting when it comes to the luxuriously creamy texture, so while I do personally enjoy stirring a bit of sour cream into the soup, it is completely optional and can easily be left out to make the soup vegan.
This soup is a budget friendly recipe which doesn’t need anything fancy, just a reasonably well stocked spice collection (always a good investment for budget cooking) and you’re on your way.
What to Know about the Ingredients & Substitutions
- Canned kidney beans. The cheaper ones are fine here. Once we season and puree them, I didn’t see much difference between the cheap and the premium beans.
- Onions, carrots and celery form the base of the soup. I personally go a little light on the carrot and celery compared to a lot of similar recipes because, well, I don’t really like when I can taste them. I just like them to blend in. You can definitely adjust this to your own tastes and increase the carrot and celery if you wish.
- The fennel seeds are optional. Use them if you have them, but they are not a deal breaker. We have plenty else going on.
- The sour cream adds some nice tang and just ups the creamy factor a little, but again, it is optional. If you want to make this dairy free, you can leave it out or replace it with a vegan sour cream if there is a brand you like.
- Let’s talk salt! If your beans are unsalted, I think it is wise to add a little salt into the soup, but that’s up to you. (If you aren’t sure whether your beans are salted, here are a couple of pointers: In the UK, regular canned beans are not salted but some of the posher jarred ones will be. In the US, beans are generally salted unless they are specifically the low sodium ones. I don’t have experience with the bean salting tendencies of other countries, however.)
The toppings will make or break this soup
The soup is delicious on its own, but the right toppings are what make it a satisfying, varied and fun meal. A meal you’ll be excited to make again. Some ideas:
- Crunchy crumbled tortilla chips. Go for plain corn tortillas, no flavorings, and lower salt. Or you can fry up little strips of corn tortilla yourself.
- Chopped cilantro (fresh coriander) or chives.
- Avocado slices or cubes, or a dollop of guacamole.
- Pico de gallo or just some finely diced tomato and onion.
- Black olives.
- Grated or crumbled cheese.
- It’s not a topping, per se, but this goes well with the cheesy dippers that I included in this black bean soup recipe.
More Mexican Style Bean Recipes
Smoky Kidney Bean Soup
Ingredients
- 1 large white or brown onion
- 1 small carrot
- ½ stalk celery
- 5 cloves garlic, crushed
- 2 tbsp tomato paste
- 1 tsp fennel seeds
- 2 tsp smoked paprika
- ½ tsp chili powder
- 2 tsp ground cumin
- 1 tsp ground coriander
- ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- 28 oz (800 g) canned kidney beans, drained and rinsed
- 3.5 cups (830 ml) vegetable stock
- ½ tsp salt, see notes
- ½ lime, for juicing
- ⅓ cup (80 ml) sour cream , optional
Toppings
- crumbled tortilla chips
- sour cream
- lime wedges
- chopped cilantro (coriander)
Instructions
- In a large soup pot, heat a shallow layer of coconut or olive oil and saute the onions, carrots and celery over a low heat until they are all soft. This will be around 10-15 minutes.
- Add the tomato paste to the pan and stir through for a few more minutes, then add the garlic and fennel seeds and mix until their fragrance is releasing.
- Add the ground spices and mix through, again adding more oil if the pan feels dry, just until the spices are fragrant.
- Add the beans to the pan and mix through.
- Now pour in the vegetable stock and allow the soup to simmer for at least 15 minutes.
- Remove from the heat and puree the soup. The easiest way is to use a hand blender to puree the soup directly in the pan. If you don't have one, you can use a jug blender as an alternative. You just need to allow it to cool down a little and then blend it in small batches.
- When you're ready to serve the soup, squeeze in juice of 1/2 lime (saving the other half to cut into wedges for serving) and stir the sour cream through the soup until it's just mixed in.
- Serve with your choice of toppings.
Absolutely fabulous, so tasty and the addition of lime and crushed tortilla chips at the end really gives it extra oomph. So easy too, delicious!