With summer in the rearview mirror and cooler temps upon us, it feels fitting to share the comforting recipe for Pasta e Fagioli with you today! This rustic soup is warming, filling, healthy, and feeds an army too!
What is Pasta e Fagioli?
Pasta e Fagioli is a traditional Italian soup made with pasta and beans. It’s inexpensive, made with everyday ingredients, and is the perfect dish to whip up on a Sunday afternoon (glass of wine in hand for an extra dash of cozy!) then enjoy for Sunday dinner. Leftovers reheat beautifully for easy lunches all week long, OR you can transfer the soup into Ziplock freezer bags and freeze flat for another time!
Pasta e Fagioli Ingredients:
Like I said, the ingredients for Pasta e Fagioli are humble, simple, and easy to find. I bet you’ve got most if not all of them on hand in the fridge and pantry right now.
- Ground beef. I prefer using 85/15 or 80/20 ground beef in soups and stews as it stays tender without drying out.
- Fresh vegetables: carrots, celery, onions, and garlic not only flavor the Pasta e Fagioli, but make it wholesome and nutritious.
- Crushed tomatoes and tomato sauce.
- Beef broth.
- Kidney and Great Northern Beans. Inexpensive, filling, and packed with nutrients.
- Short cut gluten free pasta.
- Seasonings and herbs: salt, pepper, oregano, basil, dried parsley, and thyme.
- Parmesan cheese. Both grated parmesan cheese and parmesan cheese rind flavor this soup.
I mentioned that this soup freezes very well. Since gluten free pasta doesn’t hold up well to freezing after cooking though, I advise you cook the gluten free pasta fresh then add to the soup after thawing from frozen.
Allllrighty, let’s cook!
How to Make Pasta e Fagioli Soup:
Start by browning ground beef in a large soup pot, seasoning with homemade seasoned salt and pepper. Drain if there’s a lot of grease then return to the pot and add sliced carrots, celery, shallot or onion, and garlic. Saute for 10 minutes, stirring every so often.
Next add a crushed tomatoes, tomato sauce, beef broth, light red kidney beans, great northern beans, plus dried oregano, dried basil, dried parsley, dried thyme, and a parmesan cheese rind, which will give the soup depth of flavor like you wouldn’t believe!
Bring the soup up to a bubble then turn the heat down to medium and simmer for 50-60 minutes, or until your desired consistency is reached, stirring every so often. I like my Pasta e Fagioli to be almost ragu-like, so I simmer for a full hour.
Just before eating, cook up your favorite gluten free short cut pasta – I use elbows – then add to bowls and scoop the hot Pasta e Fagioli on top. Stir to combine, top with freshly grated parmesan cheese, then dig in! I hope you enjoy this hearty, filling dish!
More Cozy Soups To Try:
- One-Pot Chicken and Rice >
- Vegetable Beef and Rice Soup >
- Smoked Sausage, White Bean and Spinach Soup >
- Italian Sausage and Vegetable Soup >
- Signature Chili >
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Pasta e Fagioli
Description
Pasta e Fagioli is hearty, filling, easy and inexpensive to make. This gluten free soup recipe is the epitome of comfort food!
Ingredients
- 1lb ground beef
- 1 cup baby carrots or 1 large carrot, thinly sliced
- 2 stalks celery, thinly sliced
- 1 small onion or large shallot, chopped
- homemade seasoned salt and pepper
- 2 cloves garlic, pressed or minced
- 28oz can crushed tomatoes
- 15oz can tomato sauce
- 15oz can beef broth + more for reheating
- 15oz can light red kidney beans, undrained
- 15oz can great northern beans, undrained
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1 teaspoon dried basil
- 1 teaspoon dried parsley
- 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
- 2x2" parmesan rind (optional) + freshly grated parmesan cheese for topping
- 8oz short-cut gluten free pasta
Directions
- Brown ground beef in a large soup pot over medium-high heat, seasoning with homemade seasoned salt and pepper. Drain if theres a lot of excess fat then return beef to the pot. Add carrots, celery, onion or shallot, season again with seasoned salt and pepper then saute for 7 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add garlic then continue to saute for 3 more minutes.
- Add all remaining ingredients except the pasta to the pot then turn heat to high to bring to a bubble. Turn heat down to medium then simmer for 50-60 minutes or until soup has thickened, stirring occasionally.
- When soup has 15 minutes left to cook, cook pasta in boiling water then drain and divy up between bowls. Remove parmesan cheese rind from soup then scoop over pasta and serve with freshly grated parmesan cheese.
This recipe is courtesy of Iowa Girl Eats, http://iowagirleats.com.
My variation of this recipe uses my homemade mild Italian sausage instead of ground meat, 2 fire-roasted red peppers diced, and 1 26oz. jar of non-meat spaghetti sauce. A different twist with another dimension of flavor. Yours looks excellent!
Non mi capita mai di fare commenti sui blog che leggo, ma in questo caso faccio un’eccezione, perché il blog merita davvero e voglio scriverlo a chiare lettere.
[…] Copycat Olive Garden Pasta e Fagioli Soup […]
Love love love this soup
I am going to try this recipe – it is the best I’ve seen in searching for similar Olive Garden Pasta e Fagioli soup. I LOVE THE WAY YOU PREENTED EVERYTHING with all the pictures!
Thank You!
[…] Olive Garden’s Pasta e Fagioli and I looked on one of my favorite blogs and why yes she had a recipe all right! This soup is awesome! It’s nice and hearty with great Italian flavors! It […]
Had this at OG once and knew I had to make it for myself. Came across your recipe and made it tonight! Good enough to invite my mom over tomorrow for lunch! Lol
Another hit from IGE! I travel a ton for work, so I like making big batches of soups, etc., when I am home so I know my husband isn’t eating McD’s the whole time I’m gone. This was a winner!
This soup is excellent; however, I had Olive Gardens soup this week, and it did not have any meat. Another difference I noticed was OG had zucchini in it.
Curious whether it’d work if the pasta was cooked in the soup broth instead of separately… Anything to get out of doing another dish!
Sure, I think that’d be ok! I’d just add 2 or 3 extra cups of broth.
Love this recipe! Made it for the second time tonight. Only thing is I put all the ingredients to a simmer and then add the pasta without cooking it first. Saves a dirty pan and works wonderfully. :)
This is a wonderful recipe, thank you! The only thing I did was increase the amount of garlic (we love garlic in my house!) and volume of broth to 4 cups because I wanted more “soup”. Otherwise, fantastic!
[…] NOTES: Recipe adapted from Iowa Girl Eats […]
My boyfriend loves this soup at Olive Garden. On our last visit he had a very disappointing experience. I decided to find a recipe to right the wrong. This is it! I found it, cooked it, he loved it!!!
[…] (adapted from Iowa Girl Eats) […]
The OG soup I’ve had in restaurants on the west coast has more spice (heat) than is indicated in this recipe. It’s not exactly a spicy soup at OG, but it has a little something in it. The OG in the Midwest, on the other hand, is a little more like your recipe, probably. I live in the Midwest now and found the pasta fagioli to have less heat, as does most Midwestern food, it seems. Wish I knew what the difference in recipes is. What was in that soup I loved so much in California?
[…] and sliced carrots, celery sticks, carrot medallions, Pasta e Fagioli Soup, tuna and white bean salad, whole wheat bread, dehydrated apple slices, and […]
[…] and sliced carrots, celery sticks, carrot medallions, Pasta e Fagioli Soup, tuna and white bean salad, whole wheat bread, dehydrated apple slices, and […]
Usually use a recipe that doesn’t have meat because the hubby loves OG´s version which doesn’t have meat. I had some ground beef though that needed to be used so I found this on pinterest and decided to try it The family liked it just as well. I added some extra garlic and an additional 4 cups of broth so I could just add the ditalini at the end and it still was soupy like we prefer it. I used chicken broth because I had some to use up and that’s what our original recipe called for.
[…] loves soup from Olive Garden! When I browsing Iowa Girl Eats blog, I found her recipe for Pasta Fagioli. One wintery day in Fort Worth, I decided to try it and was […]
Can this recipe be frozen?
Hey Alex! I’ve never tried but I’m sure it’d be just fine!
I made this last night using 1.5 lbs ground beef and 12 ounces pasta. I felt it was missing something so seasoned it more but nothing. So I added another 15 ounces beef broth brought to boil and simmered for hours. It tasted just like olive gardens!!! Thanks for sharing your version.
Love it ! I substituted half italian sausage with ground beef its yummy . I am selling bowls of soup at work to support our breast cancer awareness 5k Im positive this will sell out
[…] Pinterest and came across the recipe and was dying to try it. Here is the link to the recipe http://iowagirleats.com/2012/09/13/copycat-olive-garden-pasta-e-fagioli-soup/ I highly recommend this! It’s absolutely delicious and it makes a lot! I will be bringing […]
This is excellent! So yummy and seriously restaurant quality. I made this exactly as stated (minus the Parmesan rinds)and it was incredibly delicious. This will be my Pasta Fagioli recipe from now on.
I would like to say that I made this recipe before I commented on it. I really wish people would actually make the recipes before they comment on them. These bloggers spend a lot of their free-time posting recipes and it doesn’t help them in any way if you comment without actually making the recipe. No one cares if you think they “look good”. They want to know how they actually taste.
[…] call it that): my basic recipe was tweaked from a handful of online recipes (most closely following Iowa Girl Eats and Giuliano Hazan): brown a pound of ground beef with some salt and pepper, add a cup of chopped […]
I made this tonight and we all loved it!! So delicious and hearty. Thank you for the recipe! :)
The OG out here serves this quite spicy- runny nose after 3 bites spicy. It’s a bit like chili. Does this recipe turn out spicy? (I was searching for the cayenne in the ingredients-lol)
Nope, definitely not spicy!
[…] {Copycat} Olive Garden Pasta e Fagioli […]
Delicious! Made this today & my family loved it. The only thing I would do differently next time is add the cooked pasta to the serving bowl & add the soup on top instead of mixing the cooked pasta into the soup. It absorbs so much liquid so quickly!
It’s 20 degrees outside, so I thought this a perfect time to try this. I’ve actually never tried Olive Garden’s version; I always eat Zuppa Toscana when I visit the restaurant. This was an easy to follow recipe and the result was SCRUMPTIOUS with lots of leftovers. Great with homemade bread and blueberry cobbler. We are rubbing our bellies and smiling; thank you!
I made this last night and it was so good! Perfect cold weather food. LOVE your blog and recipes!!!
[…] aDAPTED FROM: http://WWW.COOKINGCLASSY.COM , DAMNDELICIOUS.NET, IOWAGIRLEATS.COM […]
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[…] I adore this soup and now got me craving some! This actually would be pretty easy to make in college. So I was wondering, why use tomato sauce and not just more crushed tomatoes? This image is meant to be a source of inspiration.No copyright infringement intended.I do not own images posted on this page. For more details please visit this link : iowagirleats […]
Yummo! Made this for dinner tonight and will definitely be making again. Thanks for sharing
this recipe says its for a serving of 4??? Seems like a lot of ingredients for a small serving?? Also has anyone froze this soup??
This soup was excellent. I made a couple of modifications. I Used garbanzo beans along with the kidney beans. I also used 1 15.5 can of tomatoes and 1 8 oz can tomato sauce. My husband thought it was very good.
Can this soup be frozen?
I think that’d be fine, Terre!
[…] Copycat Olive Garden Pasta e Fagioli Soup […]
[…] Copycat Olive Garden Pasta e Fagioli Soup […]
[…] Copycat Olive Garden Pasta e Fagioli Soup […]
[…] Copycat Olive Garden Pasta e Fagioli Soup […]
[…] Copycat Olive Garden Pasta e Fagioli Soup […]
[…] Copycat Olive Garden Pasta e Fagioli Soup […]
[…] Copycat Olive Garden Pasta e Fagioli Soup […]
Delicious soup.. one of the best soup menu of olive garden.
Excellent tastes just like Olive Garden’s my go to soup when I need to make something for my in laws.
[…] Copy Cat Olive Graden Pasta e Fagioli from Iowa Girl Eats […]
[…] Pasta e Fagioli Soup – Cheer yourself up with this awesome tomato based soup which is packed full of delicious vegetables, ground beef, beans and pasta. […]