I love this vegetable soup recipe! It’s made with a light tomato broth and packed with healthy veggies. It’s so comforting and satisfying!
I’ve been making this simple recipe for years. It’s light, nutritious, and genuinely makes you feel good! I make it all year round and love that the recipe is adaptable to whatever veggies are sitting in your fridge or the season.
This cozy soup comes together in just one pot, making it perfect for a fuss-free, flavorful meal. I love making a big batch and keeping it in the fridge for easy lunches or dinners throughout the week! If you love creamy soups, see our creamy vegetable soup.
Key Ingredients
- Vegetables: We use a lot of veggies for this soup, but feel free to use what you have on hand. I love onion, carrot, celery, potato or sweet potato, cabbage, and peas. You can customize this recipe with your favorite seasonal vegetables! In the summer, add fresh zucchini or corn. In the winter, try hearty root vegetables like parsnips or turnips. The possibilities are endless! I use a similar list of veggies for this easy cabbage soup.
- Tomato Paste and Tomatoes: Make the base of our deliciously light broth. If you have fresh tomatoes, use them! I’ve shared how many you’ll need to substitute canned in the tips section of the recipe.
- Garlic, Fennel Seeds, Bay Leaves, & Red Pepper Flakes: Add a lovely flavor to our soup. I love fennel with vegetables and use either ground or crushed whole fennel seeds in this soup. Pepper flakes add a hint of heat (use as much as you like for your preferred spice level).
- Broth: You can use your favorite broth in this recipe. I love this homemade vegetable broth when I have it on hand (it also makes this soup vegan and vegetarian). Use chicken broth, homemade bone broth (or store-bought) for a higher protein soup.
- Apple Cider Vinegar or Lemon Juice: I love adding a bit of vinegar or fresh lemon juice before serving this soup. It brightens all the flavors and makes them pop. Fresh herbs do the same, so if you have some fresh parsley or other green herb in the kitchen, chop and add it just before serving.
Find the full recipe with measurements below.
How to Make Vegetable Soup
Tip 1: Build a solid flavor base: Start your soup with a classic mirepoix (a mix of sautéed onions, carrots, and celery). Adding tomato paste at this stage helps to deepen the flavor and give your soup a richer color.
Tip 2: Layer your aromatics: Don’t just dump all your spices in at once. After the initial sauté, stir in aromatics like garlic, fennel, salt, and pepper, and cook for a minute. This way, they get a chance to release their flavor into the soup, but won’t burn before adding the liquid.
Tip 3: Simmer until tender: Simmering for about 20 minutes is key to getting the vegetables tender. There’s no need to cook much longer than that.
Tip 4: Add quick-cooking ingredients last: Ingredients that cook quickly, like frozen peas or spinach, should be added at the end to prevent them from becoming mushy and maintain their bright color and texture.
Tip 5: Finish with a pop of flavor: Before serving, taste your soup and adjust the seasonings. A splash of apple cider vinegar or fresh lemon juice at the end can brighten up the flavors and make the soup taste less one-dimensional (a problem I’ve had with veggie soups).
My Favorite Veggie Soup Variations
- To add protein, stir in cooked or canned beans. Try white beans, chickpeas, lentils, and black beans. See our lentil soup or this white bean soup with vegetables for inspiration.
- To add pasta, stir in pasta 10 minutes before the veggies soup has finished cooking. I love smaller pasta shapes like orzo in soup or adding tortellini (like in this veggie tortellini soup).
- To make it creamy, add a splash of cream, milk, or unsweetened dairy-free milk at the end. You can also stir in a little bit of unsweetened yogurt or sour cream. Or blend all the ingredients like we do with this creamy veggie soup.
- Or, add more veggies! You can add as many vegetables as you like to this veggie soup recipe. Feel free to toss in a handful of other vegetables, such as cauliflower, broccoli, summer squash, or corn.
More Easy Soup Recipes
Easy Vegetable Soup
- PREP
- COOK
- TOTAL
This hearty vegetable soup recipe is healthy, easy to make, and tastes amazing. It’s also vegan when you use vegetable broth. Since vegetables vary by seasonality, swap or add different vegetables for the veggies listed below. Kale or spinach, for example, is an excellent substitute for cabbage.
Watch Us Make the Recipe
You Will Need
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 cups chopped onion, 1 large
1 ½ cups chopped carrot, 3 to 4 carrots
1 ½ cups chopped celery, 2 to 3 stalks
2 tablespoons tomato paste
4 teaspoons minced garlic, 4 cloves
¾ teaspoon ground fennel seed
½ teaspoon ground black pepper
½ teaspoon fine sea salt, plus more to taste
⅛ to ¼ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes, optional for heat
1 (15oz) can diced tomatoes with their liquid
6 cups stock or broth, see our veggie broth or chicken stock (1.42L)
2 cups chopped potato, 2 medium
3 to 4 heaped cups chopped or shredded cabbage
2 bay leaves
1 cup frozen peas
½ teaspoon apple cider vinegar or fresh lemon juice, optional
Directions
1Sauté the vegetables: Heat the olive oil in a large Dutch oven or pot over medium heat. Add the onions, carrots, celery, and tomato paste. Cook, stirring often, until the vegetables have softened and the onions are translucent, 8 to 10 minutes.
2Add aromatics: Stir in the garlic, fennel, black pepper, ½ teaspoon of salt, and the red pepper flakes. Cook, while stirring, for one minute.
3Build the soup base: Pour in the canned tomatoes and their juices and the stock/broth. Add the potatoes, cabbage, and bay leaves. Raise the heat to medium-high and bring the soup to a boil. Partially cover the pot with a lid, then reduce the heat to maintain a low simmer.
4Simmer: Simmer for 20 minutes or until the potatoes and other vegetables are tender. Add the frozen peas and cook for five more minutes.
5To finish: Remove the pot from the heat and remove the bay leaves. Stir in the cider vinegar (or use lemon juice). Taste and season with more salt, pepper, or vinegar. Serve.
Adam and Joanne's Tips
- Storing: Homemade vegetable soup lasts in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 4 days or in the freezer for up to 3 months. I love freezing individual servings of this soup. To thaw, leave it in the refrigerator overnight and gently reheat the next day.
- Fresh tomatoes: Substitute about 1 pound (5 to 6 tomatoes) for one 15-ounce can of diced tomatoes.
- The nutrition facts provided below are estimates. Calculations included vegetable broth.
It was delicious! I’m fasting do it was perfect to break my fast on! Will make it a lot thank you!
I just made this soup tonight… It was amazing! I never made a soup before with cabbage. The cabbage complimented the tomato beautifully and gave texture and sweetness to the recipe. I grated some fresh parm on top of the hot soup before serving. Thank you! Maria
Oh, I am so happy you tried cabbage in soup (it’s actually one of my favorite soup vegetables because you can add a lot of it and it wilts down nicely). I love it so much, we shared this cabbage soup recipe, which takes this soup as a base and bumps the cabbage and spices up a bit.
Perfect in every way- couldn’t stop eating it. Made a batch on Sunday and ate all week for a delicious and healthy lunch.
My husband and I loved this soup. It was such an easy recipe and so delicious. I used orzo pasta and opted to use chicken broth. Thank you for the healthy and easy recipe.
Do not leave out the fennel seed!! I added squash & a little green bell pepper that was starting to go bad..crazy good soup!
I am visiting my sister in Switzerland and made this wonder recipe to serve with garlic bread. It was very well received by all. Highly recommend this recipe, it is simple, versatile and tasty and very, very healthy.
This was one of the easiest and BEST vegetable soups I’ve ever made! I followed everything, except I didn’t have fennel seeds and I added a rinsed, drained can of small red beans. The flavor is so good! It’s definitely in my rotation now!! Delish!
You made our day with this review! 🙂
I’m making the easy vegetable soup. Easy instructions. Smells wonderful. Look forward to when it’s cooked.
I’ve never made soup before and want to learn. I think I can do this. If adding pasta, do you cook the pasta separately then add to the cooked soup? Thank you.
Hi Rose, With soups like this one, I like adding my pasta towards the end (maybe 10 minutes or so before the soup should be done simmering).
We absolutely love this soup. My hubby requests it at least once a week! 😂It’s so full of goodness and much more tasty than other vegetable soup recipes I’ve tried. Thank you! ♥️
So good and tasty! I only add some chicken leftover to make it a complete meal. Just like my mom used to make.
Thank you for sharing.
best veggie soup ever I used chicken stock was leftover from whole chicken sectioned the previuos day pratically have to make a stock ever time I section a chicken into quarters, i didnt have tomato paste so i used a bit of tomato basil soup i didn’t have potatoes so i put asparagus instead weee! is fun meal to make your own love chicken soup reminds me of grandma and soon I will be a grandma and this fun also weee!
Plan on making this soup. I don’t have fennel seeds in my pantry(one of the few I don’t have!!) Do you think this spice woukd make or brake this recipe? Or should I buy some to have on hand and use in your recipe, which I want to try? Thanks.
I love the fennel, but the soup is still quite taste without it.
It took a long time to prep all the veggies, added chickpeas & frozen green beans BUT it was Delicious! Healthy! Hearty! Using slow cooker I put chicken tenders in first. Added frozen peas last hour. I give it 5 ⭐️ , despite lengthy prep time. It was worth it!