Minestrone Soup
hearty veggie-forward soup perfect for a crowd, a cold night, or food prep.
Prep Time 20 minutes mins
Cook Time 20 minutes mins
Course dinner, lunch
Cuisine American, Italian, soup
- 1 lb ground beef or turkey
- 1 medium onion, diced
- 1-2 c carrots, diced
- 1-2 c celery, diced
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1-16 oz can diced tomatoes
- 1-15 oz can tomato sauce
- 1-15 oz can red kidney beans, undrained
- 2 c water Add more to thin it down or less to have it be thick. The pasta will absorb some of the liquid. Can substitute in broth or bouillon, but then adjust for salt content.
After initial cook, add:
- 2 cups red cabbage, shredded can use a bag of coleslaw for a shameless shortcut
- 1 cups frozen or fresh green beans, diced
- ½-1 cup pasta, uncooked I often use tiny pasta like stars or ABCS and some small shells or ditalini. For gluten-free, you can omit this.
- 1-2 TBS Homemade Italian Dressing Mix Or to taste. See link in notes or use 1 tsp salt, ½ tsp pepper, ½ tsp each oregano and basil
Brown meat. Drain grease.
Bring all ingredients to a boil. Simmer 20 min.
Add 2c. shredded cabbage, 1c. green beans, ½ c-1 ½ c small uncooked pasta.
Bring to boil again. Simmer until pasta is tender.
Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese before serving.
Serve with breadsticks or garlic bread for dipping.
This recipe came to me via a friend from many years ago. I know that Minestrone typically is meatless but her recipe is called Minestrone and since it's a tweak of that original recipe, I still call it that too.
Sometimes I also like to add frozen or fresh spinach, chopped or julienned zucchini (towards end so it doesn’t get too mushy) or whatever other veggies need to be used up. The beauty of this recipe is it is very versatile and makes a huge pot. Leftovers might need some water added to thin it out.
This recipe freezes ok but works better to freeze without the pasta. Keyword comfort, crowd, healthy, leftovers, soup, veggie forward, versatile