This minestrone recipe with sausage is always a happy sight at our dinner table. It’s packed with loads of veggies and made with a light, cozy tomato-Parmesan broth. It’s so good.
This minestrone is my love language. Made hearty with lots of vegetables, golden-brown sausage crumbles, and the simplest Parmesan-tomato broth (thanks to a Parmesan rind). It’s pretty much guaranteed to put a smile on my face.
This recipe makes a big pot of soup, which is perfect because minestrone just gets better the next day. Make it today and enjoy it all week! If you’re looking for more soup ideas, check out our chicken and vegetable soup, Italian wedding soup, and classic minestrone (coming soon).
Key Ingredients
- Vegetables: The heart of any minestrone is lots of veggies. You can play around with what you have on hand or what’s in season, but we love using fennel, onion, carrots, celery, potato, and zucchini (or yellow squash).
- Sausage: Some minestrone recipes use pancetta, but we love swapping in Italian sausage. It makes the soup extra hearty and adds so much flavor. I usually go for mild, but spicy sausage is great if you like a little heat. You can use bulk sausage or just remove the casings from fresh links.
- Canned Tomatoes: I’m all about fire-roasted canned tomatoes for this soup. They add a little extra flavor compared to regular tomatoes.
- White Beans: Use whatever white beans you love best. Canned or cooked both work. We usually go for cannellini, navy, or Great Northern beans.
- Stock: I used chicken stock in the photos, but vegetable broth is just as good. If you want to make your own, check out our chicken stock and vegetable broth recipes.
- Garlic, Italian Seasoning, and Parmesan: These are what make the broth so good. Use fresh garlic if you can. If you have a Parmesan rind, drop it right into the pot and let it work its magic as the soup simmers. If you don’t have a rind, just stir in some grated Parmesan at the end.
Find the full recipe with measurements below.
How to Make Minestrone Soup with Sausage
Tip 1: Brown the sausage. The first step for this soup is to cook the sausage in a bit of olive oil until it browns and renders its fat. We’ll remove the sausage once it’s browned and stir it into the soup later, but we will keep the rendered fat in the pot for cooking the vegetables.
See all the tiny browned bits? This step makes the sausage more enjoyable in the soup and adds lots of flavor to the vegetables and broth.
Tip 2: Sweat the vegetables. To remove the raw flavors of the onion and fennel, briefly cook them in the rendered sausage fat. After a few minutes, that raw flavor will disappear, and they will smell sweet.
Tip 3: Toast the garlic. Just before pouring in your canned tomatoes, add the garlic, Italian seasoning, potatoes, and zucchini to the pot. A minute or so of stirring them around the pot toasts the garlic and brings out the flavor of the seasoning. We add the potatoes and zucchini at this point because they will have plenty of time to cook once you add the broth.
Tip 4: Simmer until the veggies are tender. This soup does not have a long cooking time. Once you add the broth, simmer for about 20 minutes, which should be enough time for the potatoes and zucchini to become tender.
After pouring in the stock, add a Parmesan rind. As it simmers, it perfumes the broth with a light Parmesan flavor. It’s lovely and one of the best secrets for incredible minestrone soup!
Serving Suggestions
I am perfectly happy to sit with a bowl of this soup and call it a day, but if you are looking for more, I’ve got a few suggestions for you. First off, a slice of sourdough with butter or some garlic bread would be lovely. Then, for something light, try a salad on the side. Fresh Caprese salad is perfect, as is a Caesar salad. And, if you have extra fennel in the fridge, we also love this shaved fennel salad with parmesan!
More of My Favorite Soup Recipes
Minestrone Soup with Sausage
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PREP
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This minestrone is pure comfort food. It’s loaded with Italian sausage, beans, and potatoes, and it comes together quickly. Plus, it just gets better as it sits, so you can enjoy it all week.
6 Servings
You Will Need
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
8 ounces bulk Italian pork sausage, see tips (226g)
1 medium fennel bulb, trimmed and finely chopped
1 small onion, finely chopped
3 medium carrots, peeled and finely chopped
3 ribs celery, finely chopped
1 large russet potato, peeled and chopped into 3/4-inch pieces
2 medium zucchini or yellow summer squash, chopped into 3/4-inch pieces
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon Italian seasoning
1 (15-ounce) can fire-roasted diced tomatoes
1 (15-ounce) can cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
6 cups low-sodium chicken stock or vegetable broth (1.4L)
1 to 2 ounce piece Parmesan Reggiano cheese rind
Directions
1Brown the sausage: Heat the olive oil over medium-low heat in a large, heavy soup pot or Dutch oven, then add the sausage and cook until it starts to brown, breaking it into crumbles with a spoon as it cooks. Use a slotted spoon to transfer the sausage to a bowl, but leave the rendered fat in the pan.
2Cook the veggies: Add the fennel, onion, carrot, and celery, and cook until they begin to soften and smell sweet, about 6 minutes. Stir in the potato, zucchini, garlic, and Italian seasoning and cook for about one minute.
3Build the soup: Add the tomatoes with all the juices to the vegetables, then use a wooden spoon to scrape up any browned bits stuck to the bottom of the pot. Stir in the beans and stock.
4Simmer: Stir in the browned sausage, then taste and season the broth with salt and pepper. Add the bay leaf, then push the cheese rind into the soup so it is fully submerged in the broth. Simmer, partially covered, until the vegetables are tender, 15 to 20 minutes.
5Serve: Remove any remaining cheese rind, then taste the soup and season with more salt and pepper as needed. Serve with grated Parmigiano Reggiano over the top.
Adam and Joanne’s Tips
- Storing: Keep leftover soup in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 4 days. Reheat in a saucepan over medium heat.
- Sausage: Use bulk sausage, or buy sausage formed into links and remove the casings. To do it, cut a slit down the raw sausage and pull the casing away from the meat.
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Parmesan rind: Note that the Parmesan rind won’t fully melt. It softens, melts a little bit, and mostly “steeps” like a tea bag. It adds a light flavor to the broth, but you will likely need to remove it before serving.
- The nutrition facts provided are estimates.
Nutrition Per Serving
Serving Size
1/6 of the recipe
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Calories
539
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Total Fat
31.6g
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Saturated Fat
10.5g
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Cholesterol
60.4mg
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Sodium
1140.2mg
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Carbohydrate
40.6g
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Dietary Fiber
8g
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Total Sugars
7.3g
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Protein
25.2g
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