Italian sausage, veggies, and cheese are in this comforting soup. It will warm your soul on a chilly day!
What You Will Need
Italian sausage, vegetable broth, Italian style diced tomatoes, cream cheese, tortellini, spinach, and mozzarella and/or parmesan cheese. You will need a Dutch oven or large pot. All of this is cooked in one pot on the stovetop. Yay for less dishes!
Step by Step Instructions
Brown 1 pound of Italian sausage in a Dutch oven or large pot.
Add an entire carton of vegetable broth, two cans of Italian style diced tomatoes, and one block of cream cheese.
Simmer on low for about 30 minutes or until cream cheese is melted, stirring occasionally.
Add a package of uncooked tortellini and fresh spinach leaves. Add as much or as little spinach as you want. Vegetables are not my favorite thing to eat, so I use about half of an 8 oz bag.
Simmer covered on a low, gentle boil until the tortellini is cooked through, about 15 minutes.
Top individual bowls with shredded mozzarella and/or shredded parmesan cheese. Enjoy!
Tips & Advice
I highly recommend you buy Italian sausage fresh (or as fresh as you can) from the meat counter at your grocery store as opposed to in a frozen tube. It tastes astronomically better and will add SO much more flavor to your soup than that stuff in a tube. It’s just a simple way you can make this soup taste even better!
I also highly recommend cooking this is in a Dutch oven if you have one. It just cooks things like soup beautifully! If you don’t have a Dutch oven, I highly recommend getting one. A Dutch oven changed my cooking life!
You may have noticed I didn’t add in seasoning which I typically consider a sin in the kitchen. However, since I used fresh Italian sausage that is full of seasoning plus Italian style diced tomatoes which is also full of seasoning, this soup already had a great Italian flavor and I didn’t feel it needed even MORE seasoning. If you don’t use fresh Italian sausage and/or Italian style diced tomatoes, you will need to add Italian seasoning.
A lot of people ask me what type of tortellini I use. I prefer refrigerated tortellini as opposed to frozen. My favorite brand is Buitoni brand. They have lots of different flavors. My go to is “Three Cheese Tortellini” but “Spinach and Ricotta Tortellini” comes in a close 2nd. Any flavor will work and taste amazing.
You can use vegetable or chicken broth in this recipe, I just prefer vegetable broth in this particular recipe.
I take the time to rip the stems off the spinach leaves because I don’t like munching on spinach stems but that is completely optional! It’s up to you if you want to take the time to do that. I find it oddly relaxing. That might make me certifiably insane, but it reminds me of snapping peas or shucking corn with my family when harvesting our huge garden growing up. It just forces me to slow down while I am cooking and I find great nostalgia in that!
Printable Recipe
Italian Sausage & Tortellini Soup
Ingredients
- 1 lb Italian sausage
- 1 (32 oz) carton vegetable broth
- 2 (14.5 oz) cans Italian style diced tomatoes
- 8 oz cream cheese
- 1 (20 oz) package tortellini
- 4 oz spinach leaves
- shredded mozzarella and parmesan cheese to taste
Instructions
- Brown 1 lb of Italian sausage.
- Add carton of vegetable broth, 2 cans of Italian style diced tomatoes, and one block of cream cheese. Simmer on low until cream cheese is melted, stirring occasionally.
- Add package of uncooked tortellini and fresh spinach leaves. Simmer on a low boil until the tortellini is cooked, about 15 minutes.
- Top individual bowls with shredded mozzarella and/or parmesan cheese. Enjoy!
Notes
- If you can, buy Italian sausage fresh (or as fresh as you can) from the meat counter at your grocery store as opposed to in a packaged tube.
- Cook in a Dutch oven if you have one.
- If you don’t use fresh Italian sausage and Italian style diced tomatoes, season soup heavily with Italian seasoning.
- I use refrigerated tortellini which can be found in the dairy section of most grocery stores. My favorite brand is Buitoni and my go-to flavor is “Three Cheese Tortellini” but any flavor will be great.
- You can use chicken broth instead of vegetable broth if you want.
- I like to remove the stems from my spinach. This is an optional step! Add as much or as little spinach as you want.
