Could anything be more comforting than a bowl of homemade Ham and Potato Soup?
This easy potato soup recipe combines veggies and chunks of ham in a creamy base – it’s pure comfort food.
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An Easy Soup with Leftover Ham
Baked ham means leftover ham recipes if we’re lucky! I use the bone for a ham bone soup and make another pot of soup with this recipe.
- This soup uses simple ingredients but is delicious, cozy, and creamy.
- It’s versatile – swap out the potatoes for leftover mashed or scalloped potatoes (reduce simmering time if they’re already cooked) to use up your leftovers.
- It keeps in the fridge for a few days and reheats well for lunches or quick meals.
Ingredients for Ham & Potato Soup
Potatoes – Russet potatoes have a starchy texture and are my first choice in this recipe. You can also use Yukon gold or even use up leftover roasted, mashed, or scalloped potatoes.
Vegetables – Onion, carrot, and celery (mirepoix) add great flavor to the base of this soup. You can also stir in leftover veggies like green beans and carrots are great additions too.
Ham – Leftover ham works well or you can purchase a single ham steak at the grocery store and cube it. Smoked sausage or even ground sausage are great replacements for ham.
Base – The base of this soup starts with chicken broth (because I prefer the flavor) but vegetable broth can be substituted. The addition of light cream adds creaminess while keeping the calories in check. You can swap it out for evaporated milk or even a bit of heavy cream if you’d like. Sour cream adds great flavor.
How To Make Ham and Potato Soup
I often make a crock pot potato soup which simmers all day however this version is quick to prepare for a weeknight meal.
- Melt butter and cook the onions until tender.
- Add remaining ingredients, except dairy (per the recipe below). Simmer over medium-low heat until potatoes are tender.
- Mash some of the potatoes, add cream, and simmer for a few minutes more. Stir in sour cream and serve.
Garnish with fresh parsley if you’d like and serve with a slice of homemade bread or some rolls.
Recipe Tips
- Mash just enough potatoes to thicken, the soup should have some potato and veggie chunks for texture.
- Stir in the sour cream just before serving, simmering can cause it to become grainy.
- Shredded cheddar cheese can be added (about 1 cup). Stir it in just before serving.
Storing Leftovers & Freezing
This Ham and Potato Soup can be refrigerated for up to 5 days.
It’s best to freeze this ham and potato soup without dairy. Remove a portion for freezing before adding the dairy. Thaw in the fridge overnight and then reheat leftovers on the stovetop. Stir in the dairy as directed in the recipe.
More Ham Soups
Did you enjoy this Ham and Potato Soup? Leave us a rating and a comment below!
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 medium onion diced
- 3 tablespoons butter
- 4 cups diced potatoes about 3 large potatoes
- 3 cups chicken broth
- 2 cups diced ham
- 1 large carrot chopped
- 1 rib celery sliced
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 2 teaspoons chopped fresh parsley
- ½ teaspoon dried thyme leaves
- black pepper to taste
- 1 cup half and half
- ½ cup sour cream
- salt and black pepper to taste
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
Instructions
- In a large pot, melt butter over medium heat. Add diced onion and cook until tender, about 5 minutes.
- Add the diced potatoes, chicken broth, diced ham, chopped carrot, sliced celery, minced garlic, parsley, thyme, and pepper. Stir to combine.
- Increase the heat to medium-high and bring the soup to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook for 20 minutes, or until the potatoes are tender.
- Using a potato masher, mash some of the potatoes in the pot, add half and half, and simmer for an additional 5 minutes.
- Combine the cornstarch with 1 tablespoon of water, stir into the soup, and simmer for 2 minutes.
- Remove from the heat and stir in the sour cream. Taste and add additional salt and pepper if desired.
Notes
Cheese can be added along with the sour cream. Remove from the heat and stir in until melted. For a thicker soup, combine equal parts cornstarch and water. Pour a little at a time into simmering soup while whisking to reach desired thickness. For a thinner soup, add additional chicken broth.
Nutrition Information
Nutrition information provided is an estimate and will vary based on cooking methods and brands of ingredients used.
Course Ham, Lunch, Main Course, Soup
Cuisine American© SpendWithPennies.com. Content and photographs are copyright protected. Sharing of this recipe is both encouraged and appreciated. Copying and/or pasting full recipes to any social media is strictly prohibited. Please view my photo use policy here.
hi,
this sounds wonderful. could you please tell me what size serving this recipe provides. three men here are very hearty eaters. thanks.
Hi Barbara, each serving is 1 cup. Please let us know how it turns out!
OK, maybe it’s just me, it doesn’t say when to add the half & half. It says to add the cream in two different spots. I’m assuming one is the sour cream and one is the half & half?
Half and half is the cream, I’ve updated the recipe for clarity.
Made this last night for dinner in my large Magna Lite roaster/soup pot. It was delicious and made enough soup for leftovers. Only thing I changed was to leave the potatoes whole since I could not find my masher! Also served some grated cheddar cheese on the side so that we could add the amount we wanted. I only added a small amount, but hubby added lots of cheese to his.
Definitely adding this to my favorite soups list and will be making this every time we have extra ham. My other favorite ham soup is ham and beans but due to hubby’s digestive issue doctor has said no beans, just recently, so this recipe came along just in the nick of time. Thanks Holly!
So glad this recipe was a hit, Karen, it’s a favorite in our house too.
Delicious soup recipe with great flavor results with soup worthy and easy ingredients.
Thank you, Ellen! Glad you liked it.
Can’t wait to make it.It sounds delicious!
That was really good! I honestly thought I’d have to doctor it because I never met a recipe I didn’t tweak, but other than doubling the thyme to match the amount of stock I had, I didn’t change a thing. Thank you so much!
Great to hear, Cindy!
This was absolutely delicious! The only change I made was to puree about 1/3 of it vs. mashing some of the potatoes at the end. I also used fresh parsley and about 1 extra cup of chicken broth.
This soup recipe is SOOO good!! We made two pots of it in one weekend because it was so delicious.
Great soup
I am so glad you enjoyed this soup recipe Maryanne!
Super easy and quick! Huge hit!!!!!
So glad you loved it!
Fantastic way to use up leftovers. This soup is delicious. I used up our cheesy leftover scalloped potatoes from ham dinner too as suggested in the recipe and it turned out great!
Growing up in the 40’s , we ate a lot of soup. Our potato soup was very similar, we also had bean soup. Instead of cooking the potatoes, mom would make mashed potatoes and serve the soup over the potatoes, also did so with bean soup (ham and bean). Many ways to serve and not so expensive.
I love a thick soup over mashed potatoes too, such a great comfort food!
Its really a nice recipe and mouth watering.
Turned out pretty good. I think maybe alittle less parlsey my husband loved it.
So glad you enjoyed it, Patricia.
Whole family loved this soup, husband declared it a staple dinner for this winter. Thank you!
So glad your family loved this Sarah!
Very good. I definitely need to cook a hair longer next time and use my immersion blender lightly. My large family enjoyed it. Thank you for the recipe!
This is super yummy. I didn’t use the dairy at the end since I’m lactose intolerant. My husband loved it too and suggested putting navy beans in next time. Great recipe for using leftover ham!
Navy beans are a great idea! Great to hear you and your husband enjoyed it!
This recipe looks quite delicious. I’m lactose tolerant, though. Think I could use coconut milk in place of the light cream?
We have only tried this recipe as written, but I think that coconut milk should work, Jeanne!
This soup is super yummy. I wanted something different for dinner and this soup hit the spot.
What’s the 3 tablespoons of butter for?
Hi Danielle, you can use the butter in place of olive oil to cook the onions. :)
Wow I can’t wait to try this out! This is perfect for a cold day, I will try this out this weekend. Pinned!