This Spiced Carrot and Lentil Soup features warming spices and delicious flavor. A filling vegetarian soup sure to brighten up a chilly day.
Want to make this into a full meal? We love serving this with our Kale and Brussels Sprouts Salad or our Pear Gorgonzola Salad. And don't forget the Baguette Garlic Bread!
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Why Make This Recipe
- Spiced, not Spicy: Garlic, ginger, turmeric, cumin, and coriander create layers of flavor in this soup.
- Packed with Fiber and Protein: Red lentils are a great source of both, which is particularly helpful if you are following a vegetarian diet.
- Great for Make-Ahead: Soups are some of our favorite recipes for making in advance. They always taste better the next day!
🥗 Ingredients
- Carrots: A favorite winter vegetable around here! Carrots are key to this recipe, but feel free to use a couple of parsnips as part of the pound of carrots called for.
- Red Lentils: Don’t substitute green or brown lentils in this recipe—they cook differently than red lentils, which become tender quickly (and won’t turn your soup muddy brown).
- Butter: Use either salted or unsalted for this recipe. Or, to make this a dairy-free carrot soup, replace the butter with olive oil.
- Onion: Yellow or white onions are preferred, mostly because they won’t impact the brilliant orange color of this soup.
- Spices: We use a blend of turmeric, cumin, and coriander in this recipe. You could add other spices if you prefer or change up how much of each spice you use. You could also try using curry powder or garam masala, which are spice blends.
- Vegetable Stock: You can replace this with chicken stock if you prefer.
- Parsley: The garnish of parsley is optional, but it does look very pretty against the orange soup. Cilantro is also delicious (and lovely!) as a garnish.
🥣 Step-by-Step Instructions
Rinse, peel, and thinly slice 1 pound of carrots. Mince 2 garlic cloves and grate 1 tablespoon of ginger. Chop 1 yellow onion.
Rinse ½ cup of red lentils and pick through to make sure there are no stones or other impurities. Set lentils aside. Melt 1 tablespoon butter and 1 tablespoon olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat.
Add carrot slices, onion, garlic cloves, ginger, 1 teaspoon turmeric, ½ teaspoon cumin, ½ teaspoon coriander, and 2 teaspoons salt.
Cook over medium heat for 5-7 minutes, stirring frequently, until carrots have begun to soften but not brown. Turn down the heat if the vegetables start to brown too quickly.
Then add 4 cups vegetable stock, 1 can light coconut milk, and lentils, and turn up the heat.
Bring soup to a low boil, then turn the heat down to low, cover, and simmer gently for 20-25 minutes.
When carrots and lentils are completely tender, use an immersion blender to purée soup completely.
If you don’t have an immersion blender, let soup cool slightly before puréeing in small batches in a regular blender.
Add additional salt to taste. Garnish with parsley, and serve!
🧐 Recipe FAQs for Spiced Carrot and Lentil Soup
This soup will last 4-5 days in the refrigerator, stored in an airtight container. It will thicken up after it cools. When you reheat it, you may want to add a splash of water or broth to loosen it up again.
Yes, this carrot soup freezes well. Make sure it cools completely before putting in an airtight container, freezer bag, or these Souper Cubes, then storing in the freezer.
Yes! The only non-vegan ingredient in this recipe is the butter. You can replace that with olive oil, and you have a vegan spiced carrot soup.
Carrots are a bland canvas for spice. Many spices taste delicious in carrot soup. Our favorites are the ones used here: turmeric, cumin, and coriander. But many other delicious soups use curry powder, cinnamon, cayenne pepper, garlic powder, cardamom, nutmeg, onion powder, and more.
👩🍳 Expert Tips
For a spicy carrot lentil soup, add some cayenne pepper to the rest of the spice mix. Crushed red pepper will do the job too. And try this Spicy Tomato Soup next—comforting with a kick!
Coconut milk can vary pretty dramatically in thickness, especially if you choose to add a regular can of coconut milk instead of light coconut milk. If your coconut milk is very thick, or you’ve added extra carrots or lentils, you may need to loosen up the soup further. If so, just add more vegetable broth or water.
For an extra flavor boost, a squeeze of lime is delicious with this soup!
If you’d like to garnish your bowl with a drizzle of coconut milk, reserve a tablespoon or two in the can when you pour the rest into the soup. Then at the end, take a spoon and drizzle the reserved coconut milk over your bowl of carrot soup.
Make sure that if you are using a blender with this recipe, you let the soup cool and don’t pour it all into the blender at once. Blending hot liquids can cause the top to pop off your blender. Best to go slowly with small batches of soup that is just warm (not hot).
Want to make this into a meal? Add a cold-weather friendly salad like this Endive Salad with Blue Cheese or this Pear Gorgonzola Salad.
Other Delicious Vegetarian Soups
We love soups around here. If you’re a meat-eater, you might want to check out our Creamy Tuscan White Bean Soup or our Chicken Soup with Rice. Seafood lovers should try this Cream of Crab Soup Recipe. But we have some great vegetarian offerings as well. Check these out:
If you try this recipe, we would love to hear from you! Please rate this recipe and leave a comment below—your feedback is invaluable to us.
And please follow along on Instagram, Pinterest, and Facebook or subscribe to our newsletter. We’d love to inspire you with more delicious, healthy, and seasonal recipes!
📖 Recipe
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Spiced Carrot and Lentil Soup
Ingredients
- 1 pound carrots
- ½ cup red lentils
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 small yellow onion chopped
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
- 1 teaspoon turmeric
- ½ teaspoon cumin
- ½ teaspoon coriander
- 2 teaspoons kosher salt plus more to taste
- 4 cups vegetable stock
- 1 can light coconut milk
- Chopped parsley to garnish
Instructions
- Rinse, peel, and thinly slice carrots.
- Rinse lentils and pick through to make sure there are no stones or other impurities. Set lentils aside.
- Melt butter and olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat.
- Add carrot slices, chopped onion, garlic, ginger, turmeric, cumin, coriander, and salt.
- Cook over medium heat for 5-7 minutes, stirring frequently, until carrots have begun to soften but not brown.
- Turn down the heat if the vegetables start to brown too quickly.
- Then add stock, coconut milk, and lentils, and turn up the heat.
- Bring soup to a low boil, then turn the heat down to low, cover, and simmer gently for 20-25 minutes.
- When carrots and lentils are completely tender, use an immersion blender to purée soup completely. (If you don’t have an immersion blender, let soup cool slightly before puréeing in small batches in a regular blender.)
- Add additional salt to taste.
- Garnish with parsley, and serve!
Video
Notes
This soup will last 4-5 days in the refrigerator, stored in an airtight container. It will thicken up after it cools. When you reheat it, you may want to add a splash of water or broth to loosen it up again. To freeze this soup, make sure it cools completely before putting in an airtight container, freezer bag, or Souper Cubes, then store in the freezer. Recipe Tips:
If you’d like to garnish your bowl with a drizzle of coconut milk, reserve a tablespoon or two in the can when you pour the rest into the soup. Then at the end, take a spoon and drizzle the reserved coconut milk over your bowl of carrot soup. For a spicy carrot lentil soup, add some cayenne pepper to the rest of the spice mix. Crushed red pepper will do the job too!
Nutrition
Instagram Users: Now that you've made this red lentil carrot ginger soup recipe, tag us @vanillabeancuisine or #vanillabeancuisine because we’d love to see your results!
More About Molly
Cooking healthy(ish) meals with seasonal ingredients is my passion. Trained as a French pastry chef, I spent over 10 years as a personal chef. Here you'll find well-tested recipes that you and your family will love!
Mimi Rippee says
Love this recipe! I usually let lentils be lentils, but I love that you puréed them. Red lentils are so soft in any case.
http://www.chefmimiblog.com
LauraC says
This was easy to make, creamy, flavorful, and filling. It ticked all my boxes, and I will definitely make again.
Molly Pisula says
So glad to hear that! And thanks so much for commenting!