Healthy Italian Wedding Soup
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This Healthy Italian Wedding Soup is the perfect cozy, easy dinner. Paleo, whole30 and low carb – this soup can be made in the crockpot or on the stove! It’s gluten free, grain free and dairy free but packed with flavor and veggies!
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I’m so excited to share this recipe for Healthy Italian Wedding Soup! This veggie packed cozy soup is one of my favorite things to make during the winter.
It has cute little baby meatballs, loads of veggies, and then gets simmered in a delicious, protein rich broth for maximum flavor. It’s the ultimate healthy soup, while still tasting like Authentic Italian Wedding Soup!
This soup is paleo, Whole30, gluten free, dairy free, and SO delicious. It’s perfect for lunch or dinner when it’s cold out!
In addition to being veggie packed with carrots, zoodles, celery, onions, and spinach, this soup has a good amount of protein because of the lean turkey meatballs, and there is no pasta in the soup (although you could add it!)
Yes, part of this recipe means you have to make little itty bitty meatballs. They take an extra few minutes- but they’re SO worth it.
liz’s tips for healthy italian wedding soup
- Be sure to add the zucchini noodles to your bowl ONLY when you’re ready to serve. They will not hold well in the soup! Then if you have extra soup, you can store the soup + noodles separately + the noodles wont get soggy.
- When spiralizing your zucchini noodles, squeeze them with a paper towel to absorb the moisture
- If you are saving your zucchini noodles, I like to put them in a container or a stasher bag with a folded paper towel, it will help absorb any extra moisture so they stay fresh and don’t get soggy!
- Using a food processor for ‘chopping’ herbs + veggies is the best! For the meatballs, I put the herbs, spinach, onions + garlic in the food processor and pulsed until they were fine pieces. I did the same thing for the soup!
Ingredients
You’ll also need a spiralizer. A crockpot or instant pot can be used to make this soup (or you can make it on the stove).
Lastly, a food processor would make this soup MUCH easier to make, so you don’t have to chop all the veggies by hand!
Substitutions
Meat – You can use any meat for the meatballs. Chicken or beef will work fine, but we prefer turkey.
Broth – You can use Chicken Broth, Beef Broth, Turkey Broth, or Vegetable Broth. We like to use our Pressure Cooker Bone Broth or Crockpot Bone Broth because the flavor is so rich (and it adds more protein!)
Pasta – Pasta can be substituted for zoodles if you’d like. We like small pasta like ditalini or orzo. If you like orzo, try our Italian Wedding Orzo.
Other vegetables – You can add cauliflower rice to this soup if you’d like. Feel free to add more carrots, celery, or onions.
What can be served with Italian Wedding Soup? This soup is hearty and filling on its own – but it also goes great with a loaf of bread, or alongside a sandwich or kale salad!
How to make Healthy Italian Wedding Soup
- First, mix together the batter for your meatballs. Bake the meatballs.
- While meatballs are baking, sauté your veggies.
- Add broth + cooked meatballs. Bring to a boil + cook for 30 minutes. When you’re ready to serve – stir in spinach, zucchini, or rice. Serve + enjoy!
The key to this soup is to NOT add the spinach/zoodles until you’re ready to serve. Otherwise, they’ll be soggy!
How to Store
Can this Italian wedding soup be frozen? Yes, it can! Store your soup in an airtight container. I love these containers for freezing leftovers! You can use code CLEANEATINGCOUPLE to save $$ on them!
When you’re ready to eat, defrost the night before by leaving this in the fridge, or take it out of the refrigerator and heat it over the stove/in the microwave. Separation is normal and ok! Just stir it up.
We have more tips on how to freeze soup!
I would not recommend storing this soup with the zucchini noodles in it. It will also not freeze well with the zucchini noodles added to it. The zucchini noodles absorb water, so it’s best to store them separately if you don’t want a mushy mess!
If you love ground turkey, check out these Healthy Ground Turkey Recipes!
Other healthy soup recipes:
We love soup SO much that we actually have a free healthy soup ebook! We also have a post filled with the best Healthy Soup Recipes!
Healthy Italian Wedding Soup
Ingredients
For the Meatballs:
- 1 lb ground turkey
- 1 cup spinach chopped
- 3 tablespoons coconut flour
- 1 egg
- 2 tablespoons fresh parsley
- 2 tablespoons fresh basil
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 teaspoon garlic chopped finely
For the soup:
- 1 tablespoons olive oil
- 1/2 tablespoon garlic chopped finely
- 1/2 cup onion chopped
- 1 cup celery chopped
- 2 cups carrots sliced in small circles
- 1 tablespoon fresh rosemary chopped finely
- 2 bay leaves
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 1/8 teaspoon red pepper flakes optional
- 64 oz chicken stock (2 quarts)
- 2 cups spinach chopped, off to the side
- 2 cups zucchini noodles, rice, or pasta chopped, off to the side
Instructions
StoveTop Instructions
- Preheat oven to 450
- In a bowl mix together all ingredients for meatballs until combined.
- On a lined cookie sheet (I use parchment paper), drop 1/4 inch round meatballs. They can be fairly close together as they do not spread. You can make the meatballs slightly bigger, but I prefer them smaller!
- Bake meatballs for 10 minutes, until golden brown.
- While meatballs are cooking, in a large pot, heat olive oil. Add onions, celery, garlic + carrots. Sauté for 5 minutes until onions start to soften.
- Add cooked meatballs, remaining spices, and chicken stock to the pot. Do NOT add the chopped spinach + zucchini noodles to the pot! Cook the soup on high for 30 minutes.
- Once soup is cooked, stir in chopped spinach + serve over zucchini noodles, rice or pasta of choice.
Crockpot Instructions
- Preheat oven to 450.
- In a bowl mix together all ingredients for meatballs until combined.
- On a lined cookie sheet (I use parchment paper), drop 1/4 inch round meatballs. They can be fairly close together as they do not spread. You can make the meatballs slightly bigger, but I prefer them smaller!
- Bake meatballs for 10 minutes, until golden brown.
- While meatballs are cooking, in a large pot, heat olive oil. Add onions, celery, garlic + carrots. Sauté for 5 minutes until onions start to soften. (Optional, but recommended). Add to the crockpot base once cooked.
- Add cooked meatballs, remaining spices, and chicken stock to the crockpot. Do NOT add the chopped spinach + zucchini noodles to the pot! Cook the soup on low for 6-8 hours or high for 4-6 hours.
- Once soup is cooked, stir in chopped spinach + serve over zucchini noodles, rice or pasta of choice.
Instant Pot Instructions
- Preheat oven to 450.
- In a bowl mix together all ingredients for meatballs until combined.
- On a lined cookie sheet (I use parchment paper), drop 1/4 inch round meatballs. They can be fairly close together as they do not spread. You can make the meatballs slightly bigger, but I prefer them smaller!
- Bake meatballs for 10 minutes, until golden brown.
- While meatballs are cooking, set your instant pot to sauté for 5 minutes. Add onions, celery, garlic + carrots. Sauté for 5 minutes until onions start to soften.
- Add cooked meatballs, remaining spices, and chicken stock to the instant pot. Do NOT add the chopped spinach + zucchini noodles to the pot! Set the instant pot to sealing and Pressure cook for 7 minutes. Allow the soup to natural release for 20 minutes, than quick release any remaining pressure.
- Once soup is cooked, stir in chopped spinach + serve over zucchini noodles, rice or pasta of choice.
Have you ever tried adding unconventional ingredients to your Italian Wedding Soup to give it a unique twist, such as adding kimchi or miso paste for extra flavor?
No I haven’t tried that. I don’t think kimchi would be good in this.
This soup is delicious—so rich and full of flavor, even with being so healthy. My family raved about it—we will definitely be adding this to our regular rotation. Thanks for this amazing recipe!
Very good but meatballs need salt as does the finished product
Wow! What a great soup. So flavorful! I made the meatballs first and had to hide them because everyone kept eating them while I was making the soup. I made doodles with zucchini. When it was time to eat, we added it to our bowl then poured the hot soup on top. I used all dried spices because that is what I had and it turned out great.
So happy you enjoyed it, Marisa!
Love this soup!! The meatballs came out perfect, I’m happy to say! Never made a meatball in my life til I tried this recipe! Now I’m a meatball master! Hahaha! Thanks for sharing this amazing recipe!
Awesome!!! Next time try making our and serve with sauce!
This soup was amazing .. even my picky teenagers ate every vegetable and said it’s one of their favorite meals I’ve ver made ! The meatballs were so tender and tasty. Thanks so much for this recipe!
So glad you liked it, Cindy! This makes me so happy to hear!
Super easy, quick and delicious!! I used low sodium broth so I needed to add salt, but really tasty!
Glad you liked it, Lydia! Broth is always so tricky, you’re better off using low sodium and adding at the end 🙂 Nice job!
Wow, is all I can say. Don’t hesitate to make this, it’s so good!
This soup is pretty quick to put together. I made it with chicken instead of turkey, and I used cassava flour because chicken is a little mushy. Cooking spray on the fingers helps keep it from sticking while forming meatballs. I’m sure the turkey is equally delicious.
So glad you liked it, Alyssa! It’s great with chicken, turkey, or even beef!
This is one of my favorite soup recipes. There are so many veggies and it is so delicious. I’ve added regular pasta to it too and it’s great!
Thank you so much, Lisa! It’s totally veggie loaded + yummy!