Easy Minestrone Soup (Vegetarian, Gluten Free, Vegan)
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Easy Minestrone Soup is the perfect cozy, healthy dinner! Vegetarian and easily made gluten free. Delicious and done in under 30 minutes!Make it in your crockpot, instant pot or on the stove – this hearty soup is one you’ll absolutely love! This post is sponsored by our friends at Thrive Market.
We are affiliates of Thrive Market and receive a commission if you choose to purchase a membership thorough our links.
Minestrone soup is a classic recipe we absolutely love. Our best minestrone soup recipe is veggie loaded, vegetarian, and easily made gluten free.
It’s easy to make in your crockpot or instant pot but it only takes 30 minutes on the stove!
This recipe is also made with basic affordable ingredients that you probably already have in your pantry/fridge!
Liz’s Time Saving Tips for Quick Minestrone Soup
- Cut your veggies ahead of time. You can keep them in the fridge for up to 24 hours so all you need to do is cook when it’s time for dinner!
- Use a food processor to make chopping carrots, onions + garlic SO quick.
- Use canned beans- I try to find ones that are low sodium and always rinse/drain them.
- If using dried beans, make sure to cook them ahead of time. Store in a container in your refrigerator until you’re ready to cook
Ingredients:
We got most of these ingredients from Thrive Market! It’s my favorite online grocery retailer and the prices are awesome! (You can read more in my Thrive Market Review)
Thrive Market does have a membership fee.. but in our opinion, it’s totally worth it! Now is the perfect time to sign up because you get a free gift and 30% off your first order!
Substitutions
Oil: Avocado oil or butter can be used in place of olive oil.
Veggies: Some minestrone soup recipes add chopped zucchini – I prefer to omit this because I think it gets too mushy, but you can add it if you like it. Feel free to also add more carrots/celery if you want to up the veggies! Some people also like to add small pieces of chopped potatoes – you can add them in when you’re sautéing carrots/celery/onion. Green beans are also a traditional vegetable in minestrone, feel free to add them.
Beans: I usually use cooked kidney beans to save time. You could also cook your own, or sub with navy beans, cannellini beans, or great northern beans. Feel free to double the amount of beans for extra protein in this recipe!
Dried Beans: If you’d like to use dried beans in this recipe, cook them before adding them to the soup. You’ll need about 1.5 cups cooked beans. You can use any beans in this recipe. White beans or cannellini beans would make a great substitute.
Broth: You can use chicken broth, beef broth, or bone broth for the liquid in this recipe!
Pasta: You can use any small pasta. Elbows or ‘macaroni’ are my favorites, but ditalini also work, and I’ve even seen people use broken spaghetti! Use gluten-free pasta to make the soup gluten free.
Low Sodium: If you’re watching your salt intake – omit the salt from the recipe or add it at the end to taste. Also, make sure to check your canned beans/broth. Look for low or no salt added beans/broth.
Fresh Herbs: Substitute 2 tablespoons of fresh herbs for 1 teaspoon of dried herbs.
Spinach: You can use fresh or frozen baby spinach. I haven’t tried this soup with chopped kale, but I think it would be great.
Parmesan Cheese Rind: A parmesan rind is optional but highly recommended as it adds a ton of flavor. You can find them at most specialty grocers near the cheese section. If you are vegan/dairy free- omit this from the recipe.
Adding meat:
- You can sauté bacon or pancetta when sautéing your veggies. It does add flavor, but I honestly prefer it without.
- Add cooked ground turkey or ground beef to this soup and it would be delicious! Italian sausage would also add flavor!
- Stir in cooked rotisserie chicken or cooked shredded chicken for more flavor or follow this Easy Chicken Minestrone Soup.
How to make Easy Minestrone Soup:
Making minestrone vegetable soup is so easy. That’s why this is called ‘Easy Minestrone Soup’!
- Heat your olive oil in the pan. Sauté onions, garlic, celery, and carrots until they’re soft.
- Add in broth, tomato sauce, and spices. Bring to a boil.
- Once the soup is boiling, stir in pasta.
- Cook the pasta until it’s just al dente – make sure not to overcook the pasta! It will continue to cook a bit after you shut the heat off.
- Stir in your kidney beans and spinach.
- Serve & enjoy!
Serving Suggestion
Minestrone soup is best served with a big piece of fresh bread, and lots of parmesan cheese!
Chopped fresh basil and cracked black pepper also add a lot of flavor! It’s great alongside our Healthy Chicken Caesar Salad or served with some cooked Roasted Chicken for more protein.
Storage
Help: My soup is too thick! As the soup sits, the pasta will absorb the broth/liquid and become thicker. Don’t worry! Just add more broth when you’re ready to eat your leftovers.
Reheating: This soup will last in the refrigerator for 3-4 days. You can reheat it in the crockpot, microwave or on the stove. The pasta will absorb some of the liquid overnight so you can just add some broth when reheating or enjoy it thicker
Freezing: You can freeze this soup, but it isn’t as good once it has been frozen. The pasta can get a little mushy – but it’s still totally edible! We like these containers for freezing.
We have a whole post on the best way to freeze soup!
Can you make this Vegan Minestrone Soup in the crockpot?
Yes, you can make minestrone in the crockpot – but I would really recommend making it on the stovetop. It’s super quick!
I’ve included crockpot instructions for this soup below. It’s important to note that you don’t add the beans/spinach to the crockpot until you’re ready to eat the soup. If you let them cook in the soup they will turn to mush!
Other healthy soup recipes:
We love soup recipes and have rounded up 35 Healthy Soup Recipes. We also have a free Healthy Soup Ebook you can download here!
Don’t forget – Thrive Market is still giving away a free gift and 30% off when you join. Click here to try out Thrive Market!
Easy Minestrone Soup
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 cup diced carrots
- 1 cup minced celery
- 1 cup minced onion
- 1 tablespoon minced garlic
- 1 quart low sodium vegetable stock
- 28 ounces canned tomato sauce
- 2 cups water
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
- ½ teaspoon dried basil
- ½ teaspoon dried oregano
- ½ teaspoon dried parsley
- ¼ teaspoon salt optional
- ⅛ teaspoon red pepper flakes optional
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 Parmesan cheese rind optional
- 8 ounces short grain pasta about 2 cups
- 10 ounces cooked kidney beans rinsed and drained
- 2 ounces frozen chopped spinach
Instructions
Stove Top Instructions
- In a large pot, heat olive oil. Sauté carrots, celery, onion and garlic for about 5 minutes until translucent.
- Add vegetable broth, tomato sauce, water, black pepper, basil, oregano, parsley, salt, red pepper flakes, bay leaf and parmesan cheese rind to the pot. Stir together, cover the pot and bring to a boil.
- Once soup is boiling, add pasta. Cook uncovered for half the recommended cook time on the pasta package. Do NOT overcook the pasta, because it will continue to cook slightly after you take it off the heat!
- Once pasta is partially cooked, remove from heat and stir in cooked beans and spinach.
- Discard Parmesan rind and bay leaves before serving.
- Note: The pasta will absorb a significant amount of the liquid. Add more broth if you like a thinner soup.
Instant Pot Instructions
- Set the instant pot to Sauté for 5 minutes. Heat olive oil. Sauté onions, garlic, carrots and celery for 5 minutes until translucent.
- While vegetables are cooking, drain + rinse beans.
- Add in the spices, water, broth and parmesan cheese rind. Pour the tomato sauce on top. Do not stir it. (Tomato sauce can trigger a burn notice in the instant pot!)
- Cover the pot and cook on high pressure for 3 minutes. Once the soup has cooked for 3 minutes, do a quick release of any remaining pressure.
- While the soup cooks, boil a separate pot of water and cook your pasta. Do not cook your pasta In the instant pot with everything else, it will over cook.
- Once pressure has been released, remove parmesan cheese rind. Stir in cooked beans, raw spinach, cooked pasta and serve warm!
Crockpot Instructions
- In a large pot, heat olive oil. Sauté onions, garlic, carrots and celery for about 5 minutes until translucent.
- While vegetables are cooking, drain + rinse beans.
- Add cooked vegetables, tomato sauce, spices, stock, water and parmesan cheese rind to the crockpot base. Stir together and cook on low for 4-6 hours.
- 10 minutes before serving, stir in raw pasta. Cover and set to high. Your pasta may need 5-10 more minutes depending on cook time.
- When ready to serve, discard parmesan cheese rind. Stir in cooked beans and raw spinach.
This was Christmas Eve dinner and a hit. Made one pot with beef and one with ground turkey. Added a Caesar salad and some sourdough focaccia.
This soup was super easy to make and delicious! It was simple but full of flavor ! Can’t wait to eat leftovers throughout the week
I made this for ladies Bunco night and received so many compliments. Delicious! I made as a crock pot meal and it was super easy! Thank you for a great recipe!
The perfect soup for a cold winter day! We added brown rice / quinoa noodles and some ground turkey, and it was very filling.
So glad you liked it!
This turned out SO delicious!! I made a few adjustments to the recipe (added ground turkey and a can of white beans). So so good and will definitely be making again. Perfect for the colder weather!
So glad you liked it! I love to add turkey to mine!
We really loved this hearty soup. I’m not a beef eater but I browned up some ground beef – Butcher Box of course! I added that to my husbands soup and had mine without. Cooked it on the stove, it was quick and delicious.
So glad you liked it, Toni! Thank you!
Really great soup recipe! I’ve made it a few times and each time it’s been so good, I like to add in some ground turkey too. Super easy to make which is right up my alley!
So glad you liked it, Carrie. Thank you!
So good and so easy! I did add 1 extra cup of broth and I used banza chickpea pasta. and it turned out great!
We have been trying new recipes and this one is delicious 😋 thanks for sharing.
So happy you like it!
This is a great, filling soup. So easy to make. It’s a great meal that comes together quick, you probably have all of the ingredients on hand now! The flavor is amazing. I followed the recipe exactly, used elbow noodles and it was perfect. I highly recommend giving this soup a try.
Thank you so much, Elissa!
Took me two times to perfect this one but it was worth it! 6 cups of liquid being added is intimidating for sure but trust Liz, it absolutely needs it! I even found my self adding a little more broth / water when reheating so that the noodles didn’t soak everything up. Great soup for the colder days, tastes just like how my Grandma used to make hers. Also freezes well but as mentioned above the pasta does get a little mushy, next time going to make without pasta to freeze then cook the pasta to add when reheating. Great heathy option to have on hand for quick meals on chilly days!
Thank you so much!! It’s always tough to try to get the right pasta/liquid ratio but I’m so glad you liked it!
Made this tonight and added lean ground beef and the Parmesan rind. OMG SO DELICIOUS. Thank you so much for making delicious recipes that don’t take a million specialty ingredients 🙂
So happy you liked it, Courtney! Thank you so much!
Plan on making your soup tonight. When would you suggest adding meat? Assuming cook first and then add it.
If you’re using ground meat brown it in the pot before adding your veggies. If you’re using chicken you can add it when you add the broth.
How much ground beef should I add? Should I also use beef broth?
You can brown a pound of ground beef in your pot before cooking your vegetables. You can use beef broth if you’d like but you don’t have to – up to you. any broth will work!
Made this tonight and it was delicious!
So happy to hear you liked it, Sara! Thank you!!
This soup is delicious! Hearty but not heavy, it’s perfect for the fall/ winter season. I made it in the crockpot and it turned out great. Thank you so much!
So glad you enjoyed the soup! It’s one of my favorites for the fall/winter 🙂
Absolutely mazing. this is a must try and must eat especially now that is cold.
So glad you liked it, Ervis!
Was not expecting to love this soup as much as I did! I usually prefer creamier soups but this minestrone has so much flavor! Will definitely make this again and again!
Thanks, Brynna! Glad you enjoyed the soup!!
This was so easy and delicious! My entire family enjoyed it, even with no meat which surprised me! I will definitely be making this throughout the winter!
So glad they all liked it, Katie! You could totally add cooked ground beef or even shredded chicken to it if they prefer meals with meat 🙂
This is a great soup! I added ground beef and used gluten free noodles. I also omitted the cheese to keep it dairy free. It’s delicious. I froze it in portions for lunches and it thawed really well. I will definitely make this again and again.
Awesome! Love those substitutions! Thanks Joyell 🙂
So easy and so good! This will definitely be added into my meal rotation 🙂
Yay! Love hearing that! Thanks Corinne 🙂
I really enjoyed this recipe!! So good!!
Thanks, Michelle! So glad to hear it!
This soup was delicious and so easy to make! Another great recipe to add to the lineup! Thanks for another great recipe!
So glad you liked it, Hannah! Thank you!!
I just recently found your website and I have already made an ongoing list of recipes I plan on trying! This minestrone was the perfect dinner for my husband and I. We made it in the instant pot and had no problems at all. The recipe made plenty of leftovers so it’s perfect for meal prepping. Thanks for the awesome recipe. Looking forward to trying more!
Thanks, Krissy! So glad you enjoyed the soup! If you’re looking for another soup to try check out this pot pie
How did it reheat? I’m looking at using this for lunches for a week. Will everything be mush by day 4? lol
I think by day 4 the pasta might be a little bit soggy, but if you want to – cook your pasta separate and add it in the day you want to enjoy it. that way it wont be soggy!
SO delish. Easy to make (I made on the stovetop). I already had all the ingredients on hand! Had it thick and also added water to make more soupy. Great both ways!
Thank you so much, Kim! Glad you liked it!
I was really excited to try this recipe! I am all about easy and on hand ingredients and this was both! It was so delicious!
So glad you enjoyed it, Nikki. Thank you so much!
This soup recipe is incredible and was so easy to make on the stove. I even happened to have a block of parm so I was able to add some rind which I think really elevated the flavor. I accidentally doubled the pasta…but I’m not mad about it! This will be our go-to soup for Fall and Winter. Thanks Liz and Tyler!
So glad you liked it, Lauren! Thank you so much!