Name: Lazy Slow Cooker Broccoli-Cheddar Soup
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 480 min
Total time: 510 min
Ingredients: 4 cups broccoli florets, cut into small pieces; 2 parsnips, cut into small pieces or shredded match-stick thick; 1 cup onion, diced; 4 cups vegetable or chicken broth (use vegetable broth to keep vegetarian); ½ tsp garlic powder; ½ tsp mustard powder; 2 cups shredded cheddar cheese; 1 cup half and half; salt and pepper to taste, if needed

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Easy crockpot broccoli-cheddar soup is a creamy and delicious classic. It is the perfect soup to serve with a lighter entree such as a sandwich or a salad.

Top down view of bowl of broccoli cheddar soup with fresh broccoli and cheese shreds floating on top

If you love cheese, you have come to the right place! Broccoli and cheddar are always a classic pairing, but blending them together in a slow cooker soup intensifies their flavors into pure palate harmony.

How To Make Cheddar Broccoli Soup

Broccoli, onion and spices in slow cooker

This easy soup recipe makes for a great any-day-of-the-week meal. It is made using soup stock, broccoli florets, onion, parsnips and seasonings, All ingredients are easy to find and easy to store making it a great recipe for those who like to shop just once for the whole week. It can be made with chicken stock or, if you are looking to keep it vegetarian, veggie stock. Both options taste equally delicious. Similar to Lazy Slow Cooker Tomato Soup, this recipe for broccoli cheddar soup uses an immersion blender to help fuse the ingredients and increase the thickness of the soup.

Looking to upgrade your slow cooker to a new model? Click here to see my favorite one.

A bowl of cheddar broccoli soup with some cheddar shreds melting on top.

Crockpot Soup Hints and Hacks:

This slow cooker recipe calls for fresh broccoli and parsnips. Cut broccoli into small florets and shred parsnips into match-stick thick shreds.
Not a fan of cutting onion? Stay lazy like me and skip this step by buying frozen chopped onion in the frozen veggie section of your market. It is very inexpensive and saves a lot of tears!
The cheddar cheese used in this recipe was purchased already shredded. Some people have commented that cheese melts better into soup when it is freshly shredded. I have only made this soup with pre-shredded cheese and it has worked perfectly well for me.
To help thicken soup, use an immersion blender to blend in some of the vegetables toward the end of the cooking time. This makes the soup thick enough to avoid having to add thickening agents. Click here to see the immersion blender I use.
To avoid curdling, add half and half during the last half hour of cooking. Temper half and half first by stirring a few tablespoons of hot soup into the half and half. Mixing some hot liquid in this way brings the half and half temperature up slowly enough to safely add it to the full pot of soup.
I always recommend using a slow cooker liner for easy clean up. This is a fully optional step. I usually buy liners in bulk for the best per-piece price. Click here to see what I buy.
If you choose to use a liner, please keep in mind that it is easy to catch a piece of the liner on the immersion blender and chop it up – essentially ruining the entire soup. To avoid this, don’t allow the blade of the blender fully touch the sides or bottom of the slow cooker.