Skinny Slow Cooker Potato Soup

The Christmas tree came down Monday. Brandon hauled it to the curb while the needles shed across the living room carpet like the tree was leaving a trail so it could find its way back. I vacuumed. I vacuumed again. Pine needles are immortal. They will outlast us all.

I took Grace's angel ornament off the tree last, after Brandon and the kids had gone to bed. I wrapped it in tissue paper and put it in the box with the other ornaments, between Noah's popsicle-stick frame and Mason's kindergarten star, because that's where it belongs. Next to her brothers. I closed the box and sat on the floor of the living room for a while in the dark. The house smelled like pine and dust and the particular emptiness of a room that just had a tree in it and doesn't anymore. January smells like absence. I am becoming fluent in absence.

School started Wednesday. Ethan walked out the door without looking back — twelve and already moving toward the next thing, always the next thing, and I am proud and terrified in equal measure. Olivia stood at the front door and looked at me and said, "Are you okay, Mom?" and I said yes, because that is what mothers say, and because she is ten and should not be checking on me, and because the fact that she checks on me means she is already carrying something she shouldn't have to carry, and I cannot fix that. I can only pack her lunch and put a note inside — You are brave and I love you — and hope that a note in a lunchbox is enough to offset whatever a ten-year-old carries when she remembers the sound of her mother screaming.

I pulled from the freezer every night this week. Taco soup Monday. The last of Linda's casserole Tuesday — baked until done, Linda, which turned out to be forty-two minutes at 375, and you're welcome for the specificity. Chicken alfredo Wednesday. Sloppy joes Thursday. Friday I made grilled cheese and tomato soup from a can because sometimes the freezer takes a night off and the can steps in, and there is no shame in Campbell's when you're running on three hours of sleep and the weight of a calendar that keeps turning toward the fourteenth.

The fourteenth is twelve days away. I can feel it approaching the way you feel a storm — pressure in the chest, a tightness behind the eyes. One year. I don't know how to survive an anniversary. I only know how to survive a day, and I've been doing that for 354 of them, so I suppose I'll survive this one too. The funeral potatoes are already in the freezer. They've been waiting since December. I've been waiting longer.

The funeral potatoes in my freezer aren’t the only thing I put away in December against the coming of January. I made this soup in a double batch sometime before Christmas, when I still had the bandwidth to stand at a cutting board for twenty minutes, portioned it into quart containers, and stacked them in the back of the freezer like small, quiet promises. It isn’t taco soup or chicken alfredo—it’s something slower, softer, the kind of thing that asks almost nothing of you on the night you pull it out. The “skinny” in the name matters less to me than the “slow cooker” and the fact that it tastes like someone took care of something before things got hard.

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 7 hours | Total Time: 7 hours 15 minutes | Servings: 8

Ingredients

6 medium russet potatoes (about 3 lbs), peeled and cut into 3/4-inch cubes
1 medium yellow onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
3 1/2 cups low-sodium chicken broth
1 cup low-fat (1%) milk
4 oz reduced-fat cream cheese, softened and cut into cubes
1 tsp kosher salt, plus more to taste
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp smoked paprika
2 Tbsp cornstarch mixed with 2 Tbsp cold water (optional, for thickening)
Optional toppings: shredded reduced-fat cheddar, turkey bacon crumbles, sliced green onions, light sour cream

Instructions

Load the slow cooker. Add the diced potatoes, onion, and garlic to a 6-quart slow cooker. Pour in the chicken broth. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, garlic powder, and smoked paprika. Stir briefly to distribute.
Cook low and slow. Cover and cook on LOW for 7–8 hours or HIGH for 4–5 hours, until the potatoes are completely tender and break apart easily when pressed with a spoon.
Rough-mash for texture. Use a potato masher or the back of a large spoon to mash roughly half the potatoes directly in the slow cooker. You want a mix of creamy and chunky—not fully smooth.
Add the dairy. Drop in the cream cheese cubes and pour in the milk. Stir well. If you want a thicker soup, stir in the cornstarch slurry now. Cover and cook on HIGH for an additional 20–30 minutes, stirring once halfway through, until the cream cheese is fully melted and the soup is creamy.
Taste and adjust. Season with additional salt and pepper as needed. The broth brand and potato starch levels will vary, so trust your taste here.
Serve or store. Ladle into bowls and top as desired. To freeze, let cool completely, then portion into airtight quart containers. Freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator and reheat gently on the stovetop over medium-low heat, stirring in a splash of milk to restore creaminess.

Nutrition (per serving)

Skinny Slow Cooker Potato Soup — What the Freezer Holds Until You Need It