This warming and comforting easy vegan Minestrone Soup Recipe is the perfect way to welcome the cooler weather! Each hearty bite is filled with fire-roasted tomatoes, beans, garlic, pasta, Italian flavors, and more.
Minestrone is the perfect fall soup! It’s hearty without being heavy, Best of all, it is packed full of veggies and has amazing flavors. The best part is this recipe is super simple to toss together which makes it perfect for busy weeknights packed full of sports or weekend crammed with activities.
It does have quite a few ingredients, but don’t let that intimidate you! All that really goes into this is a little chopping, pouring, and simmering…and in about an hour and a half, you have a tasty soup ready to be served up.
My husband and I prefer this soup recipe on the thicker side…somewhere between a soup and a stew. If you prefer a thinner, soupier consistency, just add a bit of water while cooking, and it’ll turn out perfectly.
Don’t forget about adding a little bit of bread on the side. We love the Instant Pot Kings Hawaiian Rolls, Air Fryer Naan Bread, or No Knead Bread.
Why This Recipe Works
It’s loaded with nutrients – Each spoonful of this minestrone soup is packed with iron, calcium, magnesium, potassium, folate, and more. Eat up!
Easily customizable – Swap out the veggies for other veggies. It’s easy to make adjustments and tastes great too.
Meal Prep Friendly – Whip up a batch of this soup and save it for later. It’s nice to have on hand when you need a quick lunch. After reading through the Meal Prep 101, we always talk about starting out with one meal for a week or two and then adding on. This is an excellent option to start with for a week’s full of meal prep lunches or to make a batch for meal prep emergency dinners for the freezer.
🍓 Ingredients
We can’t get enough of this marvelous soup recipe, and I’m so glad to be sharing it with you. Filled with lots of healthy and delicious ingredients that I know you can’t wait to get your hands on. Let’s talk about a handful of the ingredients to get you started:
Vegetables: We love adding onions, celery, carrots, and fresh zucchini to this soup. It gives the fantastic soup flavor, and it also makes it even more filling, not to mention all the amazing nutrients you’ll get in every single bite.
Red pepper flakes: When you are in the mood for a little bit of heat, add red pepper flakes to give you just enough without going overboard. If you want the soup to be a little extra spicy, double the red pepper flakes.
Beans: We find this soup is much better when we add a variety of beans to it. That is why we use dark red kidney beans, Cannellini beans, and cut green beans. The combination is mouth-watering, and you’ll love all the protein and other nutrients you get.
⏲️ Instructions
This is one of the easiest vegan minestrone soup recipes ever! Let’s take a look at the easy steps:
Step One: Heat three tablespoons of olive oil over medium-high heat in a large pot. Then, add in the onions, carrots, celery, and zucchini. Season with salt and pepper and sauté for seven minutes.
Step Two: Pour in the minced garlic and sauté for an additional two minutes. Sprinkle in the Italian seasoning and red pepper flakes.
Step Three: Mix in the diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, vegetable broth, beans, and bay leaves. Stir it well and season to taste with salt and pepper. Bring the soup to a boil then reduce the heat to medium-low. Simmer for one hour and stir every once in a while, so it doesn’t burn.
Step Four: While the soup is simmering, prepare the pasta. Drain it and transfer to a bowl with a ½ tablespoon of olive oil. Set aside.
Step Five: Take out the bay leaves and mix in the spinach. Cook for an additional five minutes, then drizzle with lemon juice. Add pasta and cook for an additional two minutes.
🥘 Meal Prep
Chop all the veggies ahead of time and keep them stored in the fridge until you are ready to make the soup. This can be done up to 24 hours in advance.
Prepare the soup, let it cool, and store it in the fridge for up to 4 days or in the freezer for 3-6 months.
📌 Expert Tips
- I used Cellentani pasta, but you can use elbow macaroni, cavatappi, ditalini, or any small to medium tubular pasta that you’d like.
- Cut the veggies so they are around the same size. They will cook at a similar rate.
- As mentioned above, if you don’t want your soup as thick as is shown here, add a bit of water to get your desired consistency.
- The zucchini and baby spinach are optional, so if you don’t have them on hand, it’s not a big deal.
- I recommend making some homemade breadsticks or your own Homemade Kings Hawaiian Rolls to go with this dish. Super Delish!
🥄 Recipe FAQ
If you want the soup to be thicker, use 2-3 tablespoons of tomato paste. It’s a great way to add even more flavor to the soup.
If you refrigerate the soup, it will last up to 4 days. Another option is to freeze it for up to 3 months.
One easy way to freeze the soup is to put it in a freezer-safe bag. Lay it flat and freeze until solid.
Lots of foods go well with soup, but my favorite is homemade bread. Any kind of dinner rolls, bread sticks or garlic bread would go great. We also eat a lot of garden salads wit our soup too.
Related Recipes
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Minestrone Soup Recipe {Instant Pot + Ninja Foodi Options}
Ingredients
- 3 ½ tbsp Olive Oil extra virgin, divided
- 1 Large Yellow Onion chopped
- 2 Ribs of Celery chopped
- 2 Carrots peeled and chopped
- 1 Zucchini chopped
- 2 tbsp Minced Garlic
- 1 tbsp Italian Seasoning
- ½ tsp Red Pepper Flakes
- 28 oz Can Fire Roasted Diced Tomatoes
- 15 oz Tomato Sauce can
- 6 cups Vegetable Broth
- 2 15 oz Dark Red Kidney Beans cans, drained and rinsed
- 15 oz Cannellini Beans can, drained and rinsed
- ½ cup Cut Green Beans frozen
- 2 Bay Leaves
- 1 cup Cellentani Pasta dry, or substitute other tubular pasta like elbow macaroni
- 4 cups Baby Spinach
- Juice of One Lemon
- Salt and Pepper to taste
- Fresh Parsley as Garnish chopped, to taste, optional
Instructions
- Heat a large pot over medium high heat, add 3 tbsp. olive oil. Add onion, celery, carrot and zucchini. Season lightly with salt and pepper. Sauté for about 7 minutes.
- Add minced garlic. Sauté for an additional 2 minutes. Add Italian seasoning and red pepper flakes, sauté for one minute.
- Add diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, vegetable broth, kidney beans, cannellini beans, green beans and bay leaves. Stir and season to taste with salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, then reduce to medium low heat. Simmer for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.
- While soup simmers, cook pasta to al dente in a separate pot. Drain. Transfer to bowl and mix with 1/2 tbsp. olive oil to prevent pasta from sticking together. Set aside.
- Remove bay leaves. Add spinach to soup. Cook for five minutes. Then add lemon juice and cooked pasta. Cook for additional two minutes.
Notes
Nutrition
Hi!
Ginny Collins is a passionate foodie and recipe creator of Savor and Savvy and Kitchenlaughter. Indoors she focuses on easy, quick recipes for busy families and kitchen basics. Outdoors, she focuses on backyard grilling and smoking to bring family and friends together. She is a lifelong learner who is always taking cooking classes on her travels overseas and stateside. Her work has been featured on MSN, Parade, Fox News, Yahoo, Cosmopolitan, Elle, and many local news outlets. She lives in Florida where you will find her outside on the water in her kayak, riding her bike on trails, and planning her next overseas adventure.
Delicious and comforting