Sunnier days are on the horizon but the season continues to deliver wintry forecasts. These brothy soup recipes are a vehicle of warmth while you’re waiting for the temperature to rise.
Though we’re seeing a relieving string of brighter mornings, we’re sure to endure a few more downpours and cold
That means there’s still a bit of time we need to spend hunkered down, tending to wind-bitten noses and icy ears. For the season of sniffles, you might turn towards warming dishes to deliver some comfort.
These soup recipes are an ideal meal for the spring transition. As a dinnertime offering, they’re a little lighter but maintain the all-important heating properties.
New Zealand-born and UK-based cook Alex Mackay shares the recipe for this restorative bone broth, which draws flavour from a mix of onions, garlic, thyme, bay leaves and peppercorn. It’s a recipe you’ll want to make a big batch of and freeze, so you can add strong umami flavours to any brothy dishes.
Alex Mackay’s chicken broth recipe immediately comes in handy here. It’s a key ingredient in the soup that coats the herby beef koftas, mixed with warming turmeric, curry powder and zesty lemon juice. This is particularly good if you’ve got plenty of spinach on hand, as the nutritious green soaks up the salty broth.
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Thick slices of sirloin are submerged in this gingery and lemony broth. The simplicity of this recipe makes it a great option for using up leftover vegetables too – frying mushrooms, carrots and broccoli will create plenty of strong flavour. It also comes together in 30 minutes.
This recipe, from recipe editor Angela Casley, walks through a simple chicken stock base and also showcases how to build it out into a more substantial soup. She also suggests serving the bowl, filled with leeks, celery stalks and lemon, with a side of crunchy garlic bread.
Makoto Takuyama of Ponsonby restaurant Cocoro shared the recipe for this warming dish with Viva in 2020. It makes use of oft-discarded parts of a fish, which pack plenty of flavour — various seafood experts confirmed this last summer, in encouraging consumers to use every last part of the fish that they buy. In this recipe, the fish broth is also tinged with mirin, sake and bamboo shoots.
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Advertise with NZME.This is a one-pot meal, making it a convenient midweek meal. Angela Casley still creates some tasty complexity with flavours here, frying vegetables before adding a chicken stock, and finishing the serving with chopped olives, dill and parsley.
This broth is packed with greens, including bok choy, broccolini and bean sprouts. The trick with boiling greens is to keep it brief — you want to keep a sense of freshness in their texture, instead of boiling them past the point of solidity. Punchier flavours also shine through in this ingredients list, including hoisin and fish sauce.
If you’re seeking a lot of comfort, drop these homemade mushroom and cabbage dumplings into a bowl of fresh egg noodles. This recipe is a little laborious, but if you’re nursing a cold or simply wrapped away from the chill, it will provide a quiet moment of rest. For a little extra heat, serve with fresh chopped chillies or sweet and salty chilli oil.
Here, Angela Casley tops up her chicken broth with a homemade jerk paste. It’s a blend of garlic, chilli, thyme and cayenne pepper. The broth also coats a medley of kūmara, red kidney beans and corn kernels.
Tarragon stands out as the herby addition to this steaming mug, as it supplies a light licoricey and citrus flavour. This broth is an excellent way to use up your leftover chicken — you can shred it and re-enliven it in the salty soup.
Petty Pandean-Elliott shares the recipe for this vegetarian-friendly laksa but suggests the tempeh can be swapped for chicken if you’d prefer. The dish draws flavour from a homemade yellow spice paste (recipe included), makrut lime leaves and crushed cardamom pods. Petty, author of The Indonesian Table, remembers enjoying a version of this laksa with combro, a fried side made with cassava, oncom (an orange fermented soy product), chillies and basil.
The chicken in this simple noodle bowl is poached in the broth, infusing the tender meat with garlic, ginger and soy. It’s finished with a topping of chopped coriander and spring onion.
Salty and hearty, this bone broth recipe is dedicated to umami fiends. It’s a simple recipe, with big flavours from shiitake mushrooms and peppercorns. Angela Casley recommends serving with a wholemeal roll.
More soup recipes
From creamy comforts to seafood servings.
Butterbean, Potato & Bacon Soup. A holy trinity combines in this creamy and comforting soup.
Mushroom, Leek & Tarragon Soup. This silky soup gets maximal flavour out of mushrooms.
Simple, Slightly Spicy Spinach & Chickpea Soup. Naan is the perfect pair for this heartwarming spinach soup.
Lush, Hearty, Comforting Seafood Chowder. A hearty bowl that pairs best, we think, with cheesy toast.
