Potatoes is all I avoid....and in a soup if the potatoes get mushy it doesn't really matter.
But a beer cheese soup will sort of separate when thawed...I simply put it into the blender, but if you have chunks of stuff in it...that wouldn't work.
Heck....do it any way...it won't be as perfect, but it'll still taste good.
Linda C

- Vegetables tend to get a little mushy, especially potatoes, but I don't find it a problem for myself. I've made tons of vegetable soup and stew containing potatoes and have frozen it.

- Cream/dairy often tends to separate or curdle. Constantly stirring during reheating can help prevent this. Gravy (in stew) tends to separate when thawed and won't be as thick, but the flavor is fine.

- Barley, beans, and pasta also can get a little mushy. I tend to under-cook these ingredients for freezer storage.

- I add spices just before I freeze the soup, and perhaps additional seasonings during reheating.

- Garlic tends to get bitter when frozen for longer than 3 months. Onions and paprika can change flavor during freezing. Peppers can also alter in flavor and texture. Celery and celery seed can get stronger.

- Salt can loose it's savor, so I add salt when reheating.

- I tend to make a concentrated form of the soup and add water during reheating. This helps to save on freezer space.

- I reheat cream soups over boiling water in a double boiler to help prevent separating.

- Be safe when cooling the soup. You need to quick-cool a pot of soup in an ice and water bath to quickly bring the temperature down. After it's cool, it's safe to store in the refrigerator or freezer. Stir it occasionally during chilling so the inside cools as well as the contents of the pot closest to the outside of the pot.

- DO NOT cool large pots of soup/stew/chili in the refrigerator. Large quantities of hot food can bring the temperature below a safe 40°F. in the refrigerator. The inner soup in a large pot may take too long to come to food safe temperature and bacteria can grow.

- Do not place a lot of containers of hot soup into the freezer at one time - quick chill the soup first in the ice/water bath. Place the containers in different areas of the freezer so you don't reduce the freezer temperature below 0°F while it freezes - especially if freezing in large containers, like quarts or larger.
- I like to cool the soup, then portion it into single serving sizes (1/2-cup or 1-cup) plastic containers. Be sure to leave head-space for expansion during freezing. When solid, pop the soup out of the containers and stack the blocks of soup and vacuum seal the soup in FoodSaver bags. Take out the number I need and reseal the bags.

- Frozen soup has a 3-6-month freezer life. Longer if you vacuum seal it.

- Reheat all soup to a rolling boil, or at least 165°F.

-Grainlady

I never freeze soups with noodles. If I have lots of leftover chicken noodle soup I remove the noodles before freezing. I find that noodles "suck up" all the broth resulting in a soggy noodle dish not soup! Same can happen with lentils and beans.

When I've done it I've done it with things that are puréed or cooked down. I make a base with the essential vegetables (haven't done soups with meat; no reason, I just haven't). I leave out the bulk of the water/stock and whatever cream may need to be added at the end.

It's worked well for me with tomato, carrot and various bean soups.

I put the liquid soup in freezer bags. When they're frozen, I vacuum seal them. Then I let them thaw enough to lay flat and refreeze them in stacks. To use them I just add the stock and/or cream I deleted (I write the proportions on each bag) and heat.

I'm just enjoying the last bits of roasted tomato soup I made at the end of last summer to get us through Fall and Winter without tomatoes -- had it for lunch today as a matter of fact.

I freeze quite a bit of soup in one serving portions and as of a year ago, freeze everything in glass at least until I run out of little glass containers.
I like soup a lot and had gumbo for lunch.
My favorite soups for freezing are French Onion (add cheese toast later) gumbo (with okra), lentil, black bean, 32 bean, roasted red pepper, chili, chicken broth, and tomato basil.

I don't freeze anything with noodles, potatoes or big vegetables.

I don't enjoy frozen rice, it comes out so mushy.

??? Frozen rice comes out mushy?
Interesting observation....not in my experience.

I am a soup fiend! Seriously, I make soup out of everything. We have soup to start with dinner probably 4-5 nights a week during the winter, and 2 or 3 nights a week during the summer.

I freeze "cream of" soups, vegetable soups, meat soups, bean and legume soups and chowders.

About the only thing I don't freeze in my soups is pasta. Potatoes do tend to break down a bit, but who cares, the soup is just a bit thicker then! I have a tendency to use Quinoa or Millet rather than rice in soups, and they hold their texture better through freezing and have more nutritional value anyway. If I use rice in a soup it's because I've got some leftover in the fridge and toss it into whatever soup we're having.

Scotch broth generally requires an addition of stock when defrosting/reheating as barley can absorb astounding amounts of liquid.

I often freeze my soups in zip lock quart bags, with all the air pushed out. I freeze them flat, and then they stand very nicely, all in a row, in a plastic "shoe box" from the dollar store rather than falling all higgley piggley around the freezer.

Some soups lose a certain "fresh" taste when frozen, particularly "cream of" soups. This is fairly easy to remedy by tossing in a few fresh ingredients after heating. Some sliced green onions, a few quick-cooking fresh veggies, a dash of sherry, even some chopped herbs.

Rachelellen, I love the idea of freezing in ziplocks and then organizing in a plastic shoebox! I've learned my lesson about freezing in ziplock containers...DON'T! Their plastic becomes brittle and one false move and after a crash to the wood floor they are smashed and the contents are certainly not airtight!

Hello, again Linda, I'm guessing that perhaps we have a different personal preferences when it comes to the degree of doneness of our rice. For me freezing cooked rice then reheating makes it taste incredibly mushy. But thank you for sharing your experiences and opinions with me so freely and often.