Are you looking for a tasty, nutritious, and fun soup recipe the whole family will love? This is it. Bonus: this soup uses spiralized zucchini instead of regular noodles to keep it low carb.
Have you done zoodles before? If you have kids and haven’t yet tried it…do it! Kids think zucchini noodles are super fun and gladly slurp up the veggies without complaint. They are great in place of pasta for added nutrients.
Are you looking for family-friendly soup recipes? Try my Slow-cooker Creamy Chicken Enchilada or my Lazy Lasagna Soup. Both are weeknight supper savers!
Key Ingredients:
- Onion. A medium white or yellow. Have the onion, carrots, + celery chopped in advance to save time.
- Carrots.
- Celery.
- Red beans. You can sub in northern beans or pinto beans, if you prefer.
- Diced tomatoes. Use petite-diced, if you have it. If your kids don’t like tomatoes, skip this and add additional broth instead.
- Vegetable broth or Chicken Broth. If you prefer a less brothy soup reduce the amount of broth and increase the amount of beans.
- Cabbage. I prefer red but often use green cabbage because it is often easier to find.
- Zucchini. For zucchini noodles. If you can’t find the 2 kinds of zucchini just use 2 medium green zucchini which are easy to find at the grocery store.
How to make Vegetable Zoodle Soup:
I like to use a dutch oven for this soup. It works great to saute the veggies and then add the broth and cook. AND, it looks good for serving!
To meal prep this: Make your zoodles in advance, chop your veggies, and shred your cabbage. Then just throw it together when it’s time for supper.
- Make the zucchini noodles.
- Chop the vegetables, onion, garlic, carrots, celery, and cabbage.
- Saute the onion + garlic in olive oil on medium-high heat in a large pot.
- Add the carrots, celery, red beans, diced tomatoes, and vegetable broth or chicken stock, salt, and pepper bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes.
- Add the red cabbage.
- Cook for 30 minutes and then add the zoodles.
- Serve with fresh parsley and black pepper.
Optional add-ins:
- Bay leaf. Throw a bay leaf in with the liquid for additional flavor.
- Fresh herbs. If I have it on hand I’ll throw a sprig of thyme or rosemary in with the onion + garlic.
- Bell Peppers. Red bell peppers sauteed with the onion is my personal fave. When I have some on hand they definitely will make it in the pot.
- Lemon juice. Just a quick tablespoon brightens up this recipe.
- Leftover chicken. If I’m looking to make this soup my husband’s version of a full meal (although, I’m okay with just the beans as the protein but he wants to see some meat) I’ll throw in some shredded chicken thighs or rotisserie chicken.
How to Store:
Homemade veggie soup can be frozen for three months while stored in the refrigerator, it should be consumed within three days of preparation.
The best way to thaw a vegetable soup is at room temperature, this prevents the vegetables from overcooking and becoming too soft.
My hubby loves taking hot soup with him for lunch and this one is always a fave. You will want to plan on making the full batch of this soup so you can have leftovers. They are soooo yummy!
Ingredients
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 1 large onion diced
- 3 cloves of garlic finely chopped
- 2 carrots diced
- 3 celery stacks sliced
- 1 can 15.5 oz red beans rinse and drain
- 1 can 28 oz diced tomatoes
- 8 cups vegetable broth
- 1 cup red cabbage finely chopped
- 1 green zucchini spiralized
- 1 yellow zucchini spiralized
- ¼ chopped Fresh parsley
- Salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- With the help of a spiralizer, make the zucchini noodles.
- Wash and prepare the rest of the vegetables, onion, garlic, carrots, celery, and cabbage.
- In a large saucepan heat the oil over medium-high heat and add the onion, cook, until it become translucent. Add the garlic and cook for another minute.
- Add the carrots, celery, red beans, diced tomatoes, and vegetable broth, salt, and pepper bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes.
- After minutes, add the red cabbage and continue cooking for 10 minutes.
- After 30 minutes, remove from heat and add the zucchini noodles, let it sit for 5 minutes so that the noodles gets tender.
- Adjust seasoning if needed.
- Serve hot in a bowl garnish with fresh parsley.
