Making Your Own Pantry Staples: Dry Soup Mixes
Having homemade pantry soup mixes on hand is a wonderful way to save time while preparing a nutritious meal with wholesome, cost-effective ingredients. Pantry soup mixes are life-savers when you are low on fresh ingredients and don’t have time to go to the grocery store. (Or maybe it’s a blizzard outside, and staying in and cooking up a hearty pot of soup for supper is the way to go!) There is no limit to the types of soup flavors you can layer together. If you are using dried, shelf-stable ingredients, the sky is the limit with what you make!
How to Start Homemade Soup Staples
- See what shelf-stable ingredients you already have in your pantry, including pastas, whole grains, dried beans an legumes, spices, and herbs. Get inspiration from these items and decide what homemade soup mix you are going to make. For those of us that like instructions to follow, there are many online soup mix recipes to customize!
- Get out a large mason jar or seal-able plastic bag to layer your ingredients.
- Start with the grain you want the most of: typically dried pastas, grains, or dried beans or lentils. For example, to make dried minestrone soup mix you would layer mixed dried beans and macaroni pasta at the bottom of the jar. If using a larger, looser pasta, it sometimes will fit better on the top than the bottom.
- Now, layer ingredients that you need less of like your spices, herbs, and dried bullion powder. Don’t be afraid to add dried bay leaves for extra depth to your soup!
- Add enough of each ingredient to make a soup that will create the number of servings you want. If you have a large family, add enough for 6-8 servings of soup.
- For specific ingredient amounts for homemade soup mixes make sure to gain inspiration from websites, cookbooks or Pinterest!
Seasonality and Storage
Soup mixes are great to have in your pantry throughout the entire year, but especially during the fall and winter months. When the temperature starts to drop outside, there is not only less local produce available, but it also can be more comforting to enjoy a steaming hot bowl of soup versus a fresh chopped salad. During these months, the produce available like carrots, beets, potatoes, yams and onions are beautifully added to homemade soup mixes!
Store your soup mixes in jars with lids or sealed plastic bags. Using a mason jar allows you to layer the ingredients in a visually pleasant way, and is a perfectly affordable winter gift for family and friends! However, storing your soup mixes in sealable plastic bags can help reduce storage space needed if you make a large variety at once.
Be Inspired and Create
Start making soup mixes inspired by your family’s favourite soup recipes. For example, if you know that your whole family loves minestrone, try making a homemade soup mix with all the dry ingredients, adding in the fresh ingredients on the day you make it. Over time, add to your collection so that eventually you have a variety of soup mixes to pull from on those chilly days.
Below are a few ideas to get started:
- Italian Barley Soup: Layer pearled barley and dried spices and herbs like garlic powder, oregano, parsley, basil, onion powder and veggie bullion (a dried veggie broth cube or powder for deeper flavor).
- Coconut Curry Soup: Layer dried red or orange lentils and dried spices like curry powder, onion powder, garlic powder, chili pepper flakes and veggie bullion.
- Spicy Black Bean Soup: Layer dried black beans and dried spices and herbs like garlic powder, onion powder, cumin, chili powder, bay leaves and veggie bullion.
By Susan Sommerville – Registered Nutritionist/Dietitian
Meet Our Team