Make a flour-butter roux with sautéed onion and garlic, add chicken stock, simmer chopped russet potatoes until fork-tender, stir in instant potato flakes to thicken, then add half-and-half and freshly grated sharp cheddar off heat. Top each bowl with crispy bacon, sour cream, shredded cheddar, and green onion tops. About 35 minutes start to finish.

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A roux is flour cooked in fat. It is the thickening and stabilizing foundation of the soup — the step that lets you add cheddar cheese to hot liquid without it breaking into grainy curds.

Here is what happens without it: you add shredded cheddar to simmering broth, the proteins in the cheese hit high heat and tighten, the fat separates, and you end up with an oily, grainy, curdled mess that does not improve with stirring. The roux’s starch granules coat the cheese proteins as they melt, preventing them from seizing. It is also what gives the soup its thick body before the instant potato flakes go in.

Cook the roux fully — 2 minutes of constant stirring. Under-cooked roux has a pronounced raw flour taste that carries through the finished soup. You will know it is ready when it smells slightly nutty and the mixture looks like a smooth, dry paste.

Add the stock with a whisk, not a spoon. Pour in about 1 cup of stock while whisking continuously, working out any lumps before adding the rest. Once the roux is smoothly incorporated into the stock, the rest of the process is straightforward.

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This is the trick the closest copycats rely on. Chili’s doesn’t publish its recipe, but the developers who have reverse-engineered it most convincingly — CopyKat, Budget101, A Gouda Life — all land on instant mashed potato flakes as the thickener that matches the restaurant’s smooth, uniform body. It’s the step most casual home versions skip entirely.

After the potato cubes are fully tender, whisk in 2 tablespoons of instant mashed potato flakes. Within a minute or two the base thickens noticeably — more than the fresh potato pieces alone would, and smoother than mashing them in the pot would produce. The dehydrated starch in the flakes dissolves completely into the hot liquid, leaving no graininess or residue.

The amount is adjustable:

• 2 tablespoons: Chili’s-style body — coats a spoon, pours easily, clearly thicker than a regular broth-based soup
• 3 tablespoons: Noticeably thicker, closer to bisque consistency
• 4+ tablespoons: Very thick — starts to approach the texture of warm mashed potato

The flakes soak in fully within 90 seconds. Stir them in, wait, then evaluate before adding more. Once they are in, there is no removing them — err on the side of less.

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This is the opposite approach from Chili’s Skillet Queso, which relies on processed American cheese because of the extreme heat its dip station reaches. The soup’s roux base does the stabilizing work that Velveeta’s emulsifiers do in the queso — so the potato soup can use sharp cheddar with full flavor payoff.

Shred it yourself. Pre-shredded bags are coated with cellulose and potato starch to prevent clumping in the bag. Those coatings prevent the cheese from melting smoothly. A block of extra-sharp cheddar run over a box grater takes 2 minutes and produces cheddar that dissolves into the roux base like it was made for it.

Add it off heat. Once the half-and-half is in and the burner is off (or on the lowest possible setting), add the cheddar a handful at a time, stirring gently between additions. The residual heat of the hot soup is enough to melt it. High heat after the dairy is in risks breaking the whole emulsion.

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Chili’s finishes the soup with half-and-half rather than heavy cream. The roux and the potato flakes provide most of the body, so heavy cream makes the soup too rich — it tips from satisfying into overwhelming. Half-and-half adds the cream note and rounds off the potato flavor without the density.

If you substitute whole milk, the soup is lighter but still rich enough because of the roux. If you substitute heavy cream because you have it open, use 3/4 cup instead of the full cup.

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The fresh-herb note in Chili’s potato soup — the quality that distinguishes it from a strictly savory, onion-and-cheese-only version — comes from dried basil and thyme. These are the herbs most home versions leave out, and they are not decorative: they make the soup taste like more than the sum of its parts.

Basil adds a faintly sweet, green note that lifts the heavy potato and cream character. Thyme is earthy and slightly savory, with a herbaceous quality that prevents the soup from reading as purely rich and bland. Both are dried (not fresh), and both are added early in the simmering stage so their flavor fully hydrates into the base.

Do not skip them. A potato soup without them is technically correct but noticeably duller.

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Our generic Viral TikTok Loaded Baked Potato Soup uses the half-mash technique — mashing roughly half the cooked potato pieces directly in the pot — without a roux and without instant flakes. That approach produces a chunkier, fresher-tasting soup with more visible potato pieces.

	Chili’s Copycat	Generic Loaded Potato Soup
Thickener	Roux + instant flakes	Half-mash
Cheese	Block sharp cheddar	Block sharp cheddar
Cream	Half-and-half	Heavy cream
Herbs	Basil + thyme	None
Texture	Smooth, velvety	Chunky, rustic
Time	~35 min	~40 min

Neither is “better” — they are different styles of the same dish. The Chili’s version is smoother and more uniform; the half-mash version has more visible potato texture and a fresher character.

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If you have made the Chili’s Chicken Enchilada Soup, you will notice that the approach here is almost the inverse:

• The Enchilada Soup uses masa harina (corn flour) as the thickener, pepper jack Velveeta as the cheese, and chili-spiced tomato broth for a Tex-Mex flavor profile.
• The Potato Soup uses a wheat roux plus potato flakes, block cheddar, and chicken-herb broth for a classic American comfort profile.

Same restaurant, opposite technique decisions — because the two soups serve completely different occasions.

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Chili’s Loaded Baked Potato Soup is a rotating seasonal item, not a year-round menu staple. It appears most often in fall and winter months when soup demand is highest, but availability varies by location. Not every Chili’s carries it at any given time, and it has been absent from some regional menus for extended periods.

The upside: the homemade version is more reliable, costs about 80% less per serving, and can be made any time of year.

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Refrigerator: 3–4 days in an airtight container. The soup thickens further as it chills — the roux and potato starch continue absorbing liquid. Add a splash of chicken stock when reheating and stir over medium-low heat.

Freezer: Not recommended for the dairy-enriched finished soup — the half-and-half and cheddar will separate when frozen and thawed. If you want to freeze a batch, make the soup through step 4 (before adding the potato flakes and any dairy), freeze the potato-stock base, and add the flakes, half-and-half, and cheese when you reheat.

Reheating: Low and slow on the stovetop. The same rule applies on reheat as on initial making — avoid high heat with the dairy in the pot. Add a splash of stock to loosen, warm on medium-low, stir often, and add toppings fresh after the soup is hot.

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• Chili’s Chicken Enchilada Soup — masa harina and pepper jack Velveeta, the Tex-Mex counterpart to this recipe
• Chili’s Skillet Beef Queso — Velveeta and Hormel chili; the 5-minute Chili’s dip that started it all
• Chili’s Southwest Eggrolls — spicy chicken-corn-black bean filling in crispy wonton wrappers with avocado ranch
• Chili’s Baby Back Ribs — the jingle-worthy rack, dry-rubbed, low-and-slow in foil, finished under the broiler

See all Chili’s copycat recipes →