Scrambled Eggs, Cheese, and Avocado Tortilla Bowl Recipe
September 16, 2025
Creamy Tuscan Chicken Soup Recipe
My present favorite chicken soup! Creamy broth, juicy little bits of chicken, pasta shells and swirls of spinach with a sprinkle of solar dried tomato I exploit instead of croutons. Suppose – underneath the Tuscan Solar. Besides – sweater climate meals!
Let me simply say upfront – I name this Tuscan however there’s nothing authentically Tuscan about it (so far as I do know). To me, it has Tuscan vibes, so I gave it a cute identify with the hopes to pique your curiosity. Simply in case my photographs and writing doesn’t do the job nicely sufficient to persuade you that you actually need to do this creamy chicken soup!!!
In all honesty, I used to be gazing longingly at my Tuscan Chicken Pasta Bake from my cookbook, making an attempt to muster up the power to make it. As a result of that large effervescent pasta bake does require a semi-modest dedication of time to make. Value it, however sadly, time shouldn’t be all the time on my aspect.
This Tuscan Soup was born from comparable elements. A sooner, soup model of the pasta bake. I hope you fall in love with this soup as a lot as I’ve!
These of you who’ve made the Tuscan Chicken Pasta Bake will recognise most of those elements. All of the star gamers are current – solar dried tomato, spinach, chicken, pasta, cream, cheese!
Issues within the soup
Listed here are the issues which might be bobbing about within the creamy soup broth:
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Chicken – I favor thigh as a result of it’s juicier, has higher flavour and is skinny sufficient to cook dinner entire, so no uncooked meat chopping known as for. However breast can be utilized too. If utilizing chicken breast, slice horizontally into skinny steaks to sear. The thick entire breasts are too thick.
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Pasta – I exploit small shells. Any small pasta is okay right here. Suppose – ditalini, small macaroni, risoni/orzo (you’ve received half the packet left from final weeks’ salad, proper!?). Something sufficiently small to be straightforward to scoop up with a spoon that cooks in round 10 minutes. Damaged spaghetti or different lengthy pasta will even work – break into 4cm / 1.5″ items.
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Solar dried tomato – That is the garnish for this soup! As a substitute of utilizing croutons, nuts and many others. 🙂 Little chewy pops of concentrated savoury tomato flavour with swirls of the purple oil from the solar dried tomato jar.
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Garlic and onion – Flavour base!
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Celery – Vegetable of selection right here. I prefer it as a result of the color kind of blends into the soup, preserving it beautiful and white so the intense purple solar dried tomato and swirls of spinach stand out. Plus, celery is a traditional flavour base for a lot of savoury issues. Substitute with different cook-able greens. Suppose: diced zucchini, corn, carrots.
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Butter – The cooking fats of selection, as a result of it’s received extra flavour than oil.
Creamy chicken soup broth
A splash of white wine, good handful of parmesan and ending with cream offers the Tuscan soup broth nice flavour!
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Cornflour/cornstarch – That is what’s used to thicken the soup. I opted to make use of this over flour for calorie management causes. Utilizing flour, I might’ve wanted an additional 30g/2 tbsp of butter to stir the flour into in the beginning to make a roux. With cornflour, you simply combine with a little bit of water then stir it into the soup proper on the finish. Additionally, cornflour makes the soup good and glossy, which I like on this soup (flour makes broths boring).
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Wine – Simply 1/2 a cup, provides further depth of flavour so that you there’s sufficient flavour utilizing half inventory, half water, relatively than 2 litres / quarts of water. Cash saving tip. 🙂 It’s like free inventory! Doesn’t make the broth style winey, as a result of we cook dinner out the alcohol, simply abandoning beautiful savoury flavour.
Can’t devour alcohol? Change half the water for extra chicken inventory/broth.
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Cream – Offers the soup a stunning creamy mouthfeel end in addition to making the soup white. You possibly can choose to make use of milk as an alternative, however cut back water by 1/2 cup and use 1 1/2 cups milk (else soup color not as white). To get a pleasant end, I’d add a knob of butter!
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Parmesan – One other flavour enhance. Usually I like to recommend shredding your individual however I used store-bought pre-shredded for comfort right here and it melted high quality within the scorching soup (not like in tacky sauces). The sandy-type, from the fridge (not aisle please! If it ain’t within the fridge, it ain’t actual cheese! 🙂 )
Searing our personal chicken makes this soup tastier than simply including pre-cooked chicken into the soup broth. As a result of color on the chicken = tastier chicken, and the soup broth will get further (free!) flavour from the golden bits left within the pot from searing the chicken.
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Sear the chicken within the butter, simply to get some color on the floor. It doesn’t matter if it’s not cooked all through as a result of after we chop it, it will get added again into the soup. As famous above, cooking our personal chicken will get us on the trail to a extra scrumptious soup!
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Chop the chicken as soon as it’s cool sufficient to deal with. I do that whereas the pasta is cooking. Don’t fear about uncooked bits, they’ll cook dinner by means of shortly as soon as added again into the new soup broth.
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Sauté the onion, garlic and celery in the identical pot utilizing the residual butter.
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Broth & pasta – Deglaze the pot by simmering the white wine quickly till lowered by half. Deglazing simply means to dissolve the chicken-searing golden bits on the bottom of the pot into the liquid for further flavour within the soup broth.
Pasta – As soon as the broth is introduced again as much as the boil, add the pasta and cook dinner it for the time per the packet instructions (10 minutes for the small shells I used).
Chopped chicken – As soon as the pasta is in, I chop the chicken then simply add it into the broth about midway by means of the pasta cooking time.
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Thicken soup – Combine collectively the cornflour/cornstarch with a smidge of water then stir it into the soup broth. We solely use a little bit of cornflour as a result of the soup will get thickening assist from the gluten within the pasta and the cream.
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Soup finishes – Then stir within the parmesan, observe by the cream and spinach. As soon as the spinach has wilted, which ought to solely take a minute or so, the cornflour could have thickened the soup. And that’s it – able to serve!
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Solar dried tomatoes – Chop solar dried tomatoes into scattering-size-pieces.
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Ladle the soup into bowls. Sprinkle with solar dried tomato and a bit drizzle of the oil from the solar dried tomato jars (love how the purple seems in opposition to the white soup). A sprinkle of additional parmesan wouldn’t harm both. Then dig in!
Pasta loves to soak up liquid. So for those who depart the pasta in a single day within the broth, it’ll bloat and turn into overly smooth.
So to retailer leftovers, it’s finest to separate the broth from the pasta. Simply use a slotted spoon to scoop out the pasta bits then retailer the pasta and broth in separate containers within the fridge. They may hold for 3 to 4 days.
Making forward deliberately
It is a nice soup to organize forward to reheat later! Simply cook dinner the pasta, drain, thicken the soup , then retailer the chicken with pasta and soup broth individually. They are often refrigerated for 4 days or frozen for 3 months. Reheat the soup broth first, then add the pasta and chicken to reheat. I’ve popped these instructions within the recipe card too.
Hope you take pleasure in! – Johnsat x
Ingredients
- 500 g/1 lb chicken thighs , skinless boneless (Note 1 for breast)
- 1/2 tsp each salt and pepper
- 30g / 2 tbsp unsalted butter
- 1 onion , finely chopped
- 2 garlic cloves , minced
- 2 large celery stems , finely sliced (sub 2 carrots)
- 1/2 cup chardonnay or other dry white wine, optional (Note 2)
- 4 cups chicken stock/broth , low sodium
- 3 cups water
- 1 tsp cooking/kosher salt
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 250g/8 oz small pasta shells (or other small pasta, rice, potato etc – see Note 3)
- 1 cup (tightly packed) parmesan, finely grated or store bought pre-grated (sandy type) (Note 4)
- 1 cup thickened/heavy cream (Note 5 for milk sub)
- 2 packed cups baby spinach , chopped kale or similar
- 1/2 cup sun dried tomato strips , chopped into 1cm pieces, plus bit of oil drizzling (Note 6)
- 2 tsp cornflour/cornstarch mixed with 2 tsp water
Instructions
- Cook outside of chicken – Sprinkle each side with the salt and pepper. Melt butter in a large pot over medium high heat. Once foamy, place the chicken in and cook the first side for 3 minutes or until light golden, then the other side for 2 minutes – it's fine if the inside is still raw, it cooks more later. Remove onto a plate.
- Soup flavour base – Turn the stove down to medium low. Add garlic, onion and celery into the same pot then cook for 3 minutes or until the onion is softened.
- Deglaze – Turn up to high, add wine, stir, then let it simmer until the wine reduces by half.
- Broth & pasta – Add stock/broth, water, salt and pepper. Bring to a boil then add the pasta. Cook for the time per the pasta packet directions (~10 minutes), stirring every now and then so the pasta doesn't stick to the base of the pot.
- Add chicken partway – While the pasta is cooking, chop the chicken into 1.5cm / 1/2" pieces then add into the pot to finish cooking.
- Finish soup – Once the pasta is cooked, turn heat down to low. Stir in parmesan until melted. Stir in the cornflour-water mixture, cream and spinach. Stir for a minute until spinach is wilted and soup thickens slightly.
- Serve – Ladle into bowls. Sprinkle with sun dried tomato strips (and a bit of oil looks nice for finishing). Eat!
- Storing – Separate pasta from soup so it doesn't bloat, refrigerate both. Just scoop out with slotted spoon. (Note 6)
Notes
1. Chicken – If using breast, split each in half horizontally to form 2 thin steaks. Then cook per recipe.
2. Wine – Adds extra depth of flavour so you there’s enough flavour using 50/50 chicken stock/water (money saving tip 🙂 ). It’s like free stock!
For non alcoholic, either use zero-alcohol white wine or substitute half the water for more chicken stock (otherwise the broth will lack a bit of flavour).
3. Pasta subs – Other small pasta like ditalini, small macaroni, rison/orzo can be used in the recipe as written, cook per packet time. Break long strand pasta into spoonable bits.
Gluten free pasta – Make recipe as written but you might want to increase the cornflour/cornstarch slightly to thicken the soup a little because the recipe relies on the starch in gluten pasta to help thicken the soup slightly.
Potato – cube, and reduce soup cook time (1.5 cm / 0.6″ cubes cook in around 7 min). You might want to increase cornflour/cornstarch to thicken soup (same reason as GF pasta).
Rice – White rice, use recipe as written, ~1 cup uncooked rice. Not brown rice (takes too long to cook).
4. Parmesan – Store bought sandy-type parmesan melts fine in this soup. But – fridge. Not from the aisle (that ain’t cheese!)
5. Cream gives the soup a lovely creamy mouthfeel finish as well as making the soup white. If using milk instead, reduce water by 1/2 cup and use 1 1/2 cups full-fat milk (else soup colour not as white). This will shave 140 calories off each serving. Though I’d add a knob of butter!
6. Sun dried tomato is the sprinkle for this soup that keeps things interesting! All my recipes I call “Tuscan this-and-that” has it in it. 🙂 Nice change from the usual croutons and nuts, and adds a little punch of flavour, plus the red oil looks good!
7. Storing – Pasta left in broth will bloat and soften overnight. For leftovers, just scoop out all the pasta etc using a slotted spoon and store separately from the broth, in the fridge. If making ahead intentionally, for best results: do to the end of step 5, drain soup in colander, return broth into pot. Thicken soup with parmesan and cornflour slurry, add spinach. Cool. Let pasta, chicken etc in colander cool. Store both separately. Can even freeze!
Nutrition per serving. Shave 140 calories off by switching cream for milk, per note 4.
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