Hi Friend,

It's cold cold cold here which has me craving all the soups!

I got an Instant Pot (pressure cooker) a few years ago, and it helps me cook soups fast, but what happens if you don't have an Instant Pot?

I’m here to tell you that you can make soups stovetop without an Instant Pot. Here’s how to convert an IP soup recipe to stovetop:

• If the recipe calls for you to use an Instant Pot ‘sauté’ setting, cook it in a Dutch Oven or soup pot via stovetop over high heat. Then when the recipe calls for you to add liquid and seal the lid, pour the liquid into the soup pot and add a lid. Usually you have to add 30 minutes for every 8-10 minutes of an Instant Pot recipe -I’ve found it’s about 3ish minutes stovetop for every 1 minute of high pressure cooking . For example if an IP recipe says to cook it at high pressure for 8 minutes, I’d add the liquid, a lid, and cook for 30 minutes stovetop.

I hope this helps.

Theme of the week: Soup Recipes

Healthy baked potato soup The best healthy instant pot baked potato soup recipe only takes about 30 minutes start to finish. You can also make this stovetop! ​ Take me to the post!

Corn cauliflower chowder with bacon A super delicious, warming chowder soup recipe made with cauliflower, corn and bacon. ​ Take me to the recipe!

Butternut squash soup A favorite of mine, I make this multiple times every fall/winter. A time saving trick is to buy pre peeled/cut butternut squash. ​ ​ Take me to the recipe

Potato soup-no bacon-vegetarian When I was craving a warming potato soup, all the recipes I came across included bacon or some kind of meat. I just wanted a delicious vegetarian potato soup recipe! So I created this one, and it’s soooo good. I love this vegetarian potato soup. ​ Take me to the post!

Creamy chicken soup There used to be a soup at Olive Garden this was made to replicate, and let me tell you, it's sooo good, if not better than it was at the restaurant. Take me to the recipe

Tomato white bean soup This soup is so good and easy to put together, best part? It has only 5 ingredients! ​ Take me to the post!

Lentil vegetable soup This is a slow cooker recipe that's very popular on my site - rightfully so, it's a delicious and filling vegetarian soup. Take me to the recipe

Sausage sweet potato soup This instant pot sausage sweet potato soup recipe comes together in such a short amount of time! You’re going to love this flavorful soup and love how easy it is to make in an Instant pot (or slow cooker). ​ Take me to the recipe!

Chicken and dumplings soup This recipe is Ben's favorite thing I make! It's dumpling heavy and so good on a cold day Take me to the recipe

Minestrone soup with parmesan croutons This minestrone soup with parmesan croutons is a great vegetarian soup that’s hearty and makes a perfect lunch or dinner (that freezes well too!) ​ ​ Recipe & how to

On the blog this week

This weeks Love List I’m sharing my new hobby for 2025 and what I purchased to get started, and a few new kitchen items I got, along with an audiobook recommendation. Let’s dive in

Chickpea salad A super quick, super delicious high fiber vegetarian lunch option: chickpea salad. I cannot tell you how much I love this recipe! ​ Take me to the recipe

Try this no knead bread as a side This French peasant bread recipe is “so easy it makes me want to make bread” – that’s what a friend told me about this recipe and that’s the biggest takeaway! A super simple and delicious way to make bread and is great for soup sides ​ No knead bread

Personal Stories

We celebrated Serbian Christmas at the beginning of the week. Freddie got selected as Star Student and got a little Pete the Cat doll he got to take places and pose with, it was so so cute. He went on a special outing with his aunty with Pete to a restaurant and Nick took the kids to a new play cafe. Frankie loves to do lettering with me and it's so sweet (I talked about this new hobby in the love list).

I shared how I make my vision boards for the year (here). I pick my 'word of the year' and then put pretty pictures of things that embody my wishes/goals and then I print it and have it in my bathroom where I see it every day.

Do you have a word of the year?

Links I'm loving

2 links I'm loving this week:

• I've been loving learning hand lettering and doing it with Frankie. I put together an amazon shop group with everything we've purchased (here)
• I tend to make unrealistic to do lists and then get disappointed when I don't finish them. I got this notepad of a to do list that includes time so I can map out my to-dos along with things like drive times and breaks. Definitely helps. Here are the to-do lists I use (fair warning they're from London so they have international shipping...but they're so pretty lol)

Reader Comments and Recreations

I love seeing your recreations and hearing your feedback, thank you for taking the time to comment on the recipe - it truly helps it get seen by others!

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​ “My husband asked if I could please make this recipe again. I added chopped zucchini and green pepper to the mix and use a rice mix of brown rice, wild rice, and quinoa. Thanks for great recipes.” ​ ​ Comment on chicken enchilada casserole​

January giveaway Simply comment on the salmon bites with avocado and cucumber salsa post and let me know what your favorite way to enjoy salmon is! ​ One winner gets a $25 gift certificate to Starbucks or Amazon, winners choice.

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Do you create a vision board or have a word of the year?

~Phi

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