This luscious vegan asparagus soup is thick, creamy and absolutely delicious! You'd never guess it was dairy-free. It's easy to make and can be on the table in 40 minutes flat.
Asparagus is the big early spring veggie that I look forward to every year, and it's been abundant lately at my local markets. But it doesn't always feel like spring this time of year. That's why this creamy vegan asparagus soup is pretty much my ultimate early spring recipe.
Classic cream of asparagus soup is a pretty simple dish made from just a handful of ingredients, asparagus and heavy cream being the two stars of the recipe. With that in mind I set out to veganize the dish using my favorite ingredient for replicating the richness of heavy cream: cashews.
Blended cashews are my favorite ingredient for making creamy dairy-free bisque-style soups like this one. They're great at replicating that rich lusciousness you get from milk or heavy cream.
And, good news, we're using a hack that allows us to skip the usual step of soaking cashews before blending. Read on to learn how it's done!
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Ingredients You'll Need
- Fresh asparagus.
- Olive oil. Just about any high-heat oil can be substituted here. Canola oil, corn oil, coconut oil and avocado oil will all work.
- Onion.
- Garlic.
- Potato. The recipe calls for a russet, which is the best option for this soup, but other varieties like red potatoes or Yukon gold will work if that's what you have on hand.
- Raw cashews. It's important that your cashews are raw. Roasted cashews won't give your soup the right flavor or consistency.
- Vegetable broth.
- Lemon juice.
- Salt and pepper.
- Toppings. These are all optional, but feel free to garnish your vegan asparagus soup with some extra asparagus tips, coconut cream or cashew cream, fresh parsley, dill or chives.
How It's Made
The following is a detailed photo tutorial on how to make this dish. Scroll all the way down if you'd like to skip right to the recipe!
Prep everything before you begin cooking. Dice the onion, peel and dice the potato, mince the garlic, and trim and chop the asparagus.
Tip: Here's the best way to trim the woody ends from your asparagus: grab a spear, grasp it in the middle with one hand, and at the base with your other hand. Bend until the base breaks off. It will break in just the right place!
Heat the oil in a large pot and add diced onion. Sweat the onion for about 4 minutes, stirring constantly, until it becomes soft and translucent.
Add the asparagus pieces and cook them with onion until they turn bright green and tender-crisp. Add the garlic and continue cooking everything for about 1 minute.
Tip: Optionally, set aside a few asparagus tips to garnish each bowl of soup. You can use them raw, or remove them from the pot after cooking them with the onion for a few minutes but before adding the broth.
Add the broth, raw cashews, and diced potato to the pot. Raise the heat and bring the broth to a boil.
Lower the heat and let the soup simmer for about 20 minutes, until the asparagus is soft and the potato pieces are fork tender.
Tip: Boiling the cashews is what allows us to skip the step of soaking them! I borrowed this trick from my vegan broccoli cheddar soup recipe, but it works as a shortcut in many recipes where you'd normally need to let your cashews soak for several hours to soften them up for blending.
Transfer the soup to a blender or food processor and blend until its smooth and creamy. You may need to work in batches, and it may take a few minutes to fully blend the soup if you aren't using a high-powered blending device like a Vitamix.
Tip: I don't recommend using an immersion blender for this particular recipe, as it would be very challenging to get all of the cashews smoothly blended.
Warm the soup back up on the stove if needed, and season it up with salt, pepper, and a squeeze of lemon. You can also thin it with up to 2 cups of extra broth if you'd prefer a thinner soup.
Ladle the soup into bowls and top it as you like.
Leftovers & Storage
Leftover vegan cream of asparagus soup will keep in an airtight container in the refrigerator for about 3 days. I don't recommend freezing this soup.
More Creamy Vegetable Soups
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Vegan Cream of Asparagus Soup
This luscious vegan asparagus soup is thick, creamy and absolutely delicious! You'd never guess it was dairy-free. It's easy to make and can be on the table in 40 minutes flat.
Ingredients
- 2 pounds fresh asparagus spears
- 1 tablespoon olive oil, divided
- 1 medium onion, diced
- 3 garlic cloves, minced
- 4 cups vegetable broth, plus up to 2 additional cups
- 1 cup peeled and diced russet potato (about 8 ounces or half of a medium potato)
- ½ cup raw cashews
- 1 ½ tablespoons lemon juice
- Salt and pepper, to taste
Optional Toppings
- Asparagus tips
- Coconut cream or cashew cream
- Fresh dill, chives and/or parsley
Instructions
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Trim the ends from the asparagus spears (Note 1), then cut the spears into 1 to 2 inch pieces.
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Coat the bottom of a large pot with 1 tablespoon of olive oil and place it over medium heat. Give the oil a minute to heat up, then add the onion. Sweat the onion for about 4 minutes, until it becomes soft and translucent, stirring frequently.
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Add the asparagus and cook it with the onion for about 3 minutes, until it turns bright green. (Note 2)
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Add the garlic and cook it with the asparagus and onion for about 1 minute, until very fragrant.
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Stir in 4 cups of broth, along with the potato and cashews.
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Raise the heat and bring the liquid to a boil. Lower the heat and allow it to simmer for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the potato and asparagus are very soft.
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Transfer the mixture to a blender or food processor bowl in batches and the soup blend until smooth. Always be very careful when blending hot liquids.
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Return the mixture to the pot. Thin with up to 2 cups of additional broth if desired. Stir in the lemon juice and season with salt and pepper to taste. Reheat if needed.
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Ladle the soup into bowls. Garnish with toppings of choice and serve.
Recipe Notes
- To trim, grasp a spear by the middle in one hand, and by the base in another hand. Bend the asparagus until it breaks. This will remove just the tough portion at the base.
- Optionally, reserve a few tips to garnish each bowl of soup. You can set them aside and use them raw, or cook them according to step 3 and then remove them from the pot before you proceed with the recipe.
- This recipe makes about 6 cups of soup, assuming you only use 4 cups of broth.
This was delish! I made it a bit creamier with sunflower seed cream. Do u think it would freeze ok? How.long does it last in the fridge?
I froze mine it was just as good! It looks a little funky when it falls out and you put it in your kennel but once you turn the heat on low and whisk it gets all creamy again!
Wow, this was amazing and super easy! I only had 1.5 lb of asparagus so I added a package of frozen peas to the soup a minute or two before it was done. It was the hit of our luncheon!
Great idea to add peas! I'm so glad it was a hit!
Absolutely loved this recipe, my new favorite soup!
Yay!! I'm so happy to hear that!
Made this yesterday and it turned out so good! So easy. So fast. Healthy ingredients. Filling. Recipe is a keeper!
Yay!! Glad you enjoyed it!
I don’t have raw cashews but I do have almond milk. Can I use that instead?
I think it would work if you increase the amount of potato a bit!
I just made this and subbed chickpeas for the cashews- still turned out incredibly flavorful! Thank you for the delicious recipe!
Great idea! Glad you enjoyed it!
This was so delicious and was quick to make. So glad I found your website and will be trying many of your recipes! Thank you.
I'm so happy to hear that! Thanks so much!
Can I leave out the broth... Only because I don't have anything available at the moment..?
The broth adds quite a bit of flavor, but you could probably get away with subbing water. You'll probably need to increase the amount of salt as well. :)
This recipe is so delicious and EASY! My Mom’s garden is bursting with asparagus (thanks to a very wet Midwest spring) so I actually put in double the amount of asparagus and it still turned out wonderful! I will definitely be making this again!
Yay! I'm glad you enjoyed it! And I'm jealous of all your asparagus!
Absolutely love this soup -Thank you!
Very welcome! I'm so glad you like it!
Really good soup. My 9 year old son despises asparagus and he told me that this soup is "OK". That's a big deal for him to actually tolerate asparagus.
Instead of saving 8 spears, next time I would just cut off all the tips and saute those--the tips are so pretty in the soup.
Lol. Coming from a kid, I'll take it! I'm glad you enjoyed it! Thanks Erika!
Family all Loved it. Great hit!! Will not disappoint
I'm so glad it was a hit!! Thanks Karen!
I made this tonight, and it was amazing! I doubled the recipe and used a large sweet potato instead of russet potatoes. I added a half-can of coconut milk, additional fresh minced garlic, and two tablespoons of ginger paste. I garnished it with the fried asparagus tips and sunflower seeds... ABSOLUTELY AMAZING! My four-year-young vegan granddaughter loved it, as did my carnivorous twenty-one-year old son! Thank you. ❤
That sounds delicious, and I love the idea of using sweet potato! I'm so glad you enjoyed it!
SO GOOD! I added three cups of frozen peas since I only had about a cup of asparagus and subbed the cashews for tahini. Served it with black rice. One of the best meals I’ve made this year. Super rich and healthy and I definitely want to make more of in the future. Thanks so much for this :)
Sounds like a delicious meal! Glad you enjoyed it!
Excellent! I used pecans in place of cashews because that's what I had on hand.
Glad you enjoyed it! Thanks Dawn!!
Wasn't at all impressed with this soup. The soup ended up being much too watery after adding 4 cups of broth. Furthermore I would suggest straining the soup before adding salt/pepper/lemon, some strings of the asparagus were still in there. I put mine in a blender because I didn't have a food processor, I wonder if that's why it wasn't as creamy as was promised. Overall a bland flavor and won't be using this recipe again. But for those of you that like this recipe, I would recommend using full fat oat milk like Oatly (plant based, non dairy) for the final drizzle, adds a different dimension.
I'm sorry you didn't like it! Are you sure you measured everything properly? Mine always comes out thick and creamy. The blender could've been the cause of the strings, and if it didn't blend fully that might be why it was watery.
Great recipe! I added porcini mushrooms and their soaking broth at the end, and instead of garnishing with asparagus I cut off 12-16 of the asparagus heads and cut them in half and I added them back into the finished soup and cooked for 10 minutes to add texture. The real test will be my boyfriend, but I love it!
I'm glad you like it! I love porcini mushrooms, and that sounds like a delicious variation!
Excellent recipe. My husband is the one that asked for it, because he grew up in Germany eating asparagus soup. He absolutely loved it. This will be made again!
SO glad I came across this recipe. In our area fresh asparagus is abundant in spring and early summer, and this soup is so easy and good it's just a regular star. AND as the weather warms it is a treat served cold -- for that I add a little more lemon juice and a bit of smoked salt.
Husband is eating nightshade-free so I also have subbed sweet potato for the russet potato, and he liked it even better when I subbed celery root. (These don't thicken quite the same so I start with a little less broth.) Immersion blender also works well though a processor is quicker and a little more thorough.
Thank you Alissa!
How many portions does this recipe make!!??? I can't find that info anywhere
It makes 4 - it's just below the cook time near the top of the recipe.
Wonderful. My wife says we could serve it to our animal-eating friends.Dave