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Cozy Autumn Wild Rice Soup

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This Cozy Autumn Wild Rice Soup is made with fresh seasonal vegetables and greens, hearty wild rice, and a deliciously zesty, creamy broth (made with either coconut milk or cream). Instant Pot and stovetop options included!

Who’s ready to warm up with a bowl of wild rice soup? ♡

This cozy autumn wild rice soup has become one of our readers’ favorite recipes here on Gimme Some Oven these past few winters and is also hands-down one of my personal all-time faves on the blog as well. It’s loaded up with lots of my favorite fresh seasonal produce, from sweet potatoes to kale, mushrooms, carrots, celery and onions. It’s made nice and hearty with the addition of wild rice, which just so happens to be lower in calories and higher in protein than many other rices. But best of all, it is made with the most irresistible broth, seasoned with garlic and “the bays,” as I call them, and made creamy with either the addition of coconut milk, cream or a roux-based cream sauce.

After having originally written this recipe with the cream sauce, I have to say that I — as well as so many of you readers — have become much more partial to the coconut version over the past few years, which I think adds the perfect hint of sweetness to the broth to balance out all of those savory flavors, and just so happens to make this recipe vegan too. So for any of you who haven’t tried that version yet, or this soup in general, I thought I would bump it back to the top of the blog today while we’re right in the heart of cozy comfort food season. I’ve included instructions below for how to make either the dairy or vegan versions, as well as instructions for how to make this soup in either the Instant Pot (my fave), Crock-Pot, or on the stovetop. And of course, if you’re craving some nostalgic chicken and wild rice soup, you’re always welcome to toss some shredded chicken in here as well.

More than anything, though, I just wanted to pop in and say how happy I am that so many of you have tried and loved this soup! It always means so much to me to read your comments and see photos of your dinner online. So cheers to the cozy recipes that keep us all warm this time of year…and now let’s make some soup!

Autumn Wild Rice Soup Recipe (Vegan Version) | 1-Minute Video

Wild Rice Soup Ingredients

Before we get to the full recipe below, here are a few quick notes about the ingredients you will need to make this wild rice soup recipe:

  • Wild rice: I love using 100% wild rice in this recipe, which is different than a wild rice blend or black rice (which, look out, will turn your soup purple!). That said, though, you are welcome to use whatever type of rice you prefer in this soup. Just note that different varieties of rice will require different cooking times.
  • Vegetable stock: You could use either vegetable stock or chicken stock as the base for this soup.
  • Autumn veggies: A seasonal blend of sweet potato, carrots, celery, onion, mushrooms and garlic.
  • The “bays”: I’m a big fan of using Old Bay seasoning and a bay leaf to season this soup. But if you don’t have Old Bay on hand, I have included some alternate seasoning options below.
  • Coconut milk or cream sauce: I prefer the vegan version of this soup made with coconut milk, which I believe adds the perfect touch of creamy sweetness to balance out all of those savory flavors. But alternately, you could choose to make a cream sauce (made from milk and thickened with a flour/butter roux), or you could just add in some half and half or heavy cream to taste.
  • Greens: I love adding lots of fresh kale to this soup, but baby spinach, collard greens, or any other soup-friendly greens that you have in the crisper drawer would do.
  • Salt & pepper: As always, for seasoning!

How To Make Wild Rice Soup

As mentioned, I have included detailed instructions below for how to make this wild rice soup recipe either in the Instant Pot (pressure cooker) or on the stovetop. But in general, the method is to…

  1. Cook the base of the soup. Whichever cooking method you choose, we will simmer the veggies and rice in the broth (sans cream) until the rice is completely tender.
  2. (Optional) Make your cream sauce. If you choose to use the cream sauce method, you can prepare the cream sauce in a separate saucepan while the soup cooks by melting the butter, whisking in the flour, stirring in the milk and cooking the mixture until thickened. (Or you can skip this step and add in a can of coconut milk or some half and half instead.)
  3. Add in the coconut milk (or cream sauce) and kale. Once the rice is ready to go, stir in the coconut milk (or cream sauce) and kale until combined. Then taste and season with salt and pepper.
  4. Serve. And serve it up nice and warm! I love serving this soup with some crusty bread and a simple green salad. Also, note that the soup will continue to thicken as it cools. So if it gets too thick, feel free to add in extra broth and Old Bay, to taste.

Recipe Variations

This recipe is quite flexible, so feel free to experiment with whatever ingredient variations sound good! For example, you could…

  • Add chicken: To make chicken and wild rice soup, you can either add pre-cooked diced or shredded chicken to the soup. Or you can poach a raw chicken breast in the soup while the rice cooks, then remove, shred, and add it back into the soup before serving.
  • Use a different seasoning: This soup would taste delicious with a variety of different seasoning blends (in place of Old Bay), such as Cajun seasoning, Italian seasoning or herbs de Provence.
  • Make it milder. Old Bay seasoning is mildly spicy, so if you prefer your soup with less heat, I would begin with just 2 teaspoons of Old Bay. Then you can always add more to taste later, if you would like.
  • Make it gluten-free: The vegan version of this soup is naturally gluten-free. But if you are making the dairy version and would like to thicken the broth a bit, I would recommend adding a cornstarch slurry (equal parts cold water and cornstarch mixed together) to the soup until it reaches your desired consistency.

More Vegetarian Soup Recipes

Looking for some more simple, cozy, vegetarian soup recipes this season? Here are a few more of our faves… ♡

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Cozy Autumn Wild Rice Soup

5 Stars 4 Stars 3 Stars 2 Stars 1 Star 4.8 from 978 reviews
  • Prep Time: 15 minutes
  • Cook Time: 45 minutes
  • Total Time: 1 hour
  • Yield: 8 servings 1x

Description

This Cozy Autumn Wild Rice Soup features fresh seasonal produce, hearty wild rice, and a zesty creamy broth. The vegan version of the soup is listed here in this recipe, or see options below for the cream sauce version.


Ingredients

Scale
  • 6 cups vegetable stock (or chicken stock)
  • 1 cup uncooked wild rice*
  • 8 ounces baby bella mushrooms, sliced
  • 4 cloves garlic, minced
  • 2 medium carrots, diced
  • 2 ribs celery, diced
  • 1 large (about 1 pound) sweet potato, peeled and diced
  • 1 small white onion, peeled and diced
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 1 1/2 tablespoon Old Bay seasoning
  • 1 (14-ounce) can unsweetened coconut milk (or see cream sauce option below*)
  • 2 large handfuls of kale, roughly chopped with thick stems removed
  • fine sea salt and freshly-cracked black pepper

Instructions

Instant Pot (Pressure Cooker) Method:

  1. Combine base ingredients. Combine vegetable stock, wild rice, mushrooms, garlic, carrots, celery, sweet potato, onion, bay leaf and Old Bay seasoning in the bowl of an Instant Pot pressure cooker.  Stir briefly to combine.
  2. Pressure cook. Cover and cook on manual (high pressure) for 25 minutes.  Let the Instant Pot rest and naturally release the pressure for 10 minutes.  Then carefully open the vent and quick release the remaining pressure.  Remove lid and discard the bay leaf.
  3. Add final ingredients. Add the coconut milk and kale to the soup, and stir gently until combined.  Taste and season with salt and pepper (plus any extra Old Bay seasoning, if you would like) as needed.
  4. Serve. Serve warm and enjoy!

Stovetop Method:

  1. Sauté the veggies. Heat (an extra) 1 tablespoon butter or olive oil in a large stockpot over medium-high heat.  Add onion and sauté for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until soft and translucent.  Stir in the garlic and cook for an additional 1-2 minutes, stirring occasionally, until fragrant.
  2. Add base ingredients. Add in the vegetable stock, wild rice, mushrooms, carrots, celery, sweet potato, bay leaf and Old Bay seasoning.  Stir to combine.
  3. Simmer. Continue cooking until the soup reaches a simmer.  Then reduce heat to medium-low, cover and simmer for 30 to 40 minutes until the rice is tender, stirring occasionally.
  4. Add final ingredients. Add the coconut milk and kale to the soup, and stir gently until combined. Taste and season with salt and pepper (plus any extra Old Bay seasoning, if you would like) as needed.
  5. Serve. Serve warm and enjoy!


Notes

Wild rice: I used 100% wild rice which I love and recommend for this soup.  Cooking time may vary if you use a wild rice blend or a different type of rice.

Alternate cream sauce recipe: In place of the coconut milk, you can either add 1 1/2 cups half and half.  Or you can make a cream sauce by melting 3 tablespoons of butter in a (separate) saucepan over medium-high heat, whisking in 1/4 cup flour for one minute, and then whisking in 1 1/2 cups milk until the mixture is smooth.  Let the sauce cook until it nearly reaches a simmer, at which point it will thicken, then remove from heat and add the sauce to the soup once the rice has completely cooked.

Crock-Pot (Slow Cooker) Option: I decided to remove the Crock-Pot option from the recipe instructions because we have unfortunately found slow cookers to be too inconsistent in making this recipe. Different brands/models have proven to vary dramatically in terms of the cooking time required to fully soften the rice and vegetables, and too much of the broth can evaporate if the lid is not fully secure. I recommend the Instant Pot or stovetop options instead. But if you want to cook this soup in a slow cooker, just follow the Instant Pot method and slow cooker (instead of pressure cook) the soup as directed in Step 2 until the rice and veggies are tender.

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1,471 comments on “Cozy Autumn Wild Rice Soup”

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  1. Fantastic recipe! Did a couple of different things:
    – Instead of Old Bay, I seasoned with a couple sprigs’ worth of fresh thyme. DELISH.
    -I like my rice a little less al dente, so after adding the cream sauce I brought it back up to a boil to soften the rice up some more and thicken the soup.
    -Also opted for spinach over kale, and used a white sweet potato instead of orange.
    SO GOOD! Didn’t miss the meat one bit :)






  2. This was fantastic! I didn’t have a regular onion, but I used 2 leeks instead. I did leave the instapot on natural release for 18 minutes instead of 10 only because I forgot about it, but I thought the rice and veggies were perfect. Thank you!!






  3. Awesome! So I did this in the instapot and did it with oat milk/oat flour, when I added it to the pot there were lumps, I turned it to warm, added larger sliced mushrooms and kale – and I had two corn on the cobs I trimmed the kernals off. Surprisingly the corn I thought was a great addition as it added a texture. After on warm about 20m all lumps were gone and the added mushrooms were perfect. Next time I make this I will just use oat milk and cut the sweet potatoes larger- they got lost in the soup






  4. Loved this soup. Added chicken breast and did not have Old Bay so used a cajun spice had on hand. I cooked my rice in chicken broth for short time before adding to vegetables. Will make sweet potato dices larger so they hold up better even though I added the last 1/2 hour of coking. Looked like the picture. Beautiful soup and sooo delicious. Very simple to make. Have not used this site before but will go back often. Thanks Ali






    • This soup is so delicious! Everyone ate multiple bowls and my youngest is 4. We used the coconut milk in ours and the aroma was divine. Well done!






  5. This recipe is amazing! I used Cajun seasoning and coconut milk for mine. Best soup I’ve ever made, highly recommend.

    • Making this tomorrow for a group of friends. I’m using the crock pot version with coconut milk. Do I add the coconut milk in before cooking or wait until I would have added in the milk mixture if I was using that?

  6. Made the following changes: grocery store did not have wild rice so I used Wild/Brown rice combo, and didn’t have mini mushrooms so I used regular and chopped them up. Otherwise I followed the stovetop recipe exactly, making the roux version. Turned out perfect!! It’s late at night so I only had a couple of tastes – can’t wait to eat this for lunch tomorrow! My hubby and friends are sailing a boat for an 8 hour trip tomorrow, and it’s going to be almost freezing in the morning so they will need something warm. Hopefully this hits the spot! Looks just like the photo and tastes great! Thank you for this delicious, easy recipe. :)






  7. Hi! This looks amazing! Do you know if I could try it with almond milk instead of dairy milk? I try to avoid dairy but also don’t love coconut milk. TIA!

  8. Hmmm, which method did you use?

  9. This recipe turned out very well! We used it for our Meals on Wheels program so we had increase the recipe quite a bit since we cook for 80-100 people and it still turned out great. Loved that it was simple but still tasty.






  10. This was so dope! Solid Monday night dinner. Thank you!

  11. To celebrate the fall equinox my daughter made this with her 4 and 6 yr old boys today. It was delicious! I bought the ingredients on my way home and made it tonight. I used purple rice instead of wild. It was delicious also. Neither of us used kale. We both used the IP. Yum. The boys loved it also






  12. I did the Instant Pot version of this recipe. It is delicious! Next time I will try it with the coconut milk because that would really add a great flavor. Start to finish 35 min. Absolutely wonderful! I am in Wisconsin, this will be a perfect fall or after cross country skiing dinner. Thank you!!






  13. Delicious! Perfect fall/winter comfort soup. The InstantPot timing was perfect- i even added cut up boneless chicken thighs and they cooked perfectly with the directions as is. Added a 1/2 TBS of sea salt before cooking and it really made the flavors pop!






  14. Outstanding! My husband and I love the soup and it was super easy. Couldn’t find Old Bay, so I substituted it with another Cajun spice. Highly recommend!






  15. Delish! Thank you!






  16. SO SO YUMMY! I went for the stove top and coconut milk option and it was delicious! My non-vegan husband and friends loved it as well.






  17. This was so good. I was out of flour, but did have a can of coconut milk. Used it!!. Great flavor. Will definitely make this again.






  18. I wanna absolutely love this recipe but didn’t work out twice. I used the stovetop recipe and I’m not a big fan of wild rice so I used jasmine rice instead. Both times the rice was overcooked. What cook time and temperature do you suggest for the rice and veggies to be cooked at the same time?

  19. I used the Instant Pot method and was pretty excited to be using some of our hand harvested wild rice. As written, the recipe is very bland. I tried every spice combo I could think of to spice it up at the end. Next time, I would saute the veggies first and probably sub the cream sauce for heavy whipping cream and a little simmer time.






  20. Can you freeze this?






  21. Can this be frozen.

  22. My husband loved it.






  23. Looks wonderful.. wondering if it can be frozen with the coconut milk option?

  24. I made this soup in the instant pot. It was delicious. I added chicken. Will definitely be making again.






  25. Probably the best soup I’ve ever made! So good and simple.






  26. Absolutely delicious soup! We love it! Thank you ?






  27. Sooooo Yummy! Perfect for a cool fall/winter night. No need to add meat…it’s HEARTY! Will definitely be making this a permanent staple in my dinner lineup. Thanks for the recipe!






  28. Could I freeze this soup once it’s been made?

  29. Really delicious, easy to make. I’m not a kale fan so substituted spinach. Thank you for the recipe!






  30. So excited to try this recipe! Would butternut squash work in place of the sweet potatoes? Would cooking time need to be adjusted for this?

  31. This soup is a new favorite at our house! I have made it several times and it’s always delicious.






  32. Loved this!!! Hearty comfort food at it’s best! Here in MN, the most popular wild rice soup recipe is Byerly’s wild rice soup recipe and it’s good, but this was a different and yet really yummy flavor with the old bay and the mushrooms. Totally adding this to my repertoire of fall soups!






  33. I made the vegan version posted, and it was so good!! Subbed shiitake mushrooms and spinach for baby bella mushrooms and kale, and it was phenomenal.






  34. Very good !! Perfect because you have three different versions depending on how busy you are and how much time you have to get a wonderful filling soup on the table in time for dinner.






  35. If you use purple sweet potato, your soup will be purple.

  36. With the craptastic weather today I was in the mood for soup…this sounded good and had so many good comments I decided to try it. I made it as per recipe but ran into an issue or two. First, I need to remember to add salt now and then lol. I couldn’t figure out why it was so bland at first. Second, all I could find at the store was a wild rice/long grain blend and it ended up more like i pilaf instead of a soup. I was out of veggie stock so I used a cube of herb soup bullion (spelling?) and a couple more cups of water and at the end I used a can of coconut milk. It warmed the tummy on a cold, damp day! I ended up with a big batch after all this so I plan on putting zip lock bags into paper cups and then filling and freezing them. When frozen I’ll take them out of the cups and put in a larger zip top bag – ready meals for those days I just don’t want to cook! lol






  37. Can I freeze the leftovers, If so how long?

  38. I have my own meal prep business and due to the season changing I wanted to make a hearty yet healthy soup. This by far is one of the best soup I have ever made that didn’t have any meat. I actually did the insta pot method and it turned out perfect. It was as flavorful and tasty. I will definitely be keeping this soup in the rotation.






  39. Fabulous – made it for friends – IT WAS A HIT !!!
    Making it for my family tonight
    Made the vegan recipe – perfect






  40. This soup is delicious! Definitely writing it down to make again!






  41. I made this soup today.. I am not one for spicy foods, so that’s why I found the Old Bay overpowered all the other flavors. I would suggest maybe 1.5 tsps.






  42. I made this in the IP with the coconut milk and it turned out perfect. I did something that’s probably sacreligious though. As I was slicing all those mushrooms I realized my kids were NOT going to eat it like that. So I put it through the blender. It is creamy and thick and delicious! I’ll definitely make this again. Thank you!






  43. Thank you so much for including the stovetop instructions! I got bummed when I saw Instant Pot instructions bc I don’t own one, but got so excited when I scrolled and saw Stovetop! ??

  44. If using coconut milk, should we try sweetened or unsweetened coconut milk?

  45. Great and super easy. Can you freeze leftover???






  46. Same here, but it could be because I left it a little longer in crock pot as sweet potatos seemed hard to me. The flavour was amazing so I think I will try it again !






  47. This recipe was amazing! I used cajun seasoning instead of old bay because it’s what I had on hand and did the stove top. Fresh off the stove it was great, but i must have stored it wrong because it turned into rice mush the next morning. Once it cooled, I added it to individual containers and put it in the fridge and the next morning it was mush. Flavor was still great. Any idea what i did wrong?

  48. I made this soup on the stove using a rotisserie chicken. Delicious!






  49. Will, I giggled at the thought of wallpaper glue while reading your review. Unfortunately I had the same issue. I tried the stove top method and had to add ALOT of liquid back into this recipe-still being too thick. Next time I will not simmer as long and change the cream sauce which caused it to become paste-like. Recipe was simple and flavor was delicious. I will definitely be trying this again with revisions.

  50. Ahh maybe I used the wrong rice, because mine came out purple?
    I added some chicken thighs, and they absorbed the color of the rice!
    I could only find “black rice” and when I asked Google assistant it said it was the same.
    I will have to go and see what the other grocery stores have.
    Not the most visually appealing, but it tastes great.
    I used shitake mushrooms as that is what I had on hand, and cooked the kale for as long as the other vegies because it’s easier to get the kids to eat it that way.
    I cooked mine on the stove top.
    Definitely will have to google black rice vs Wild Rice again and try again.