Super Easy Slow Cooker Pasta e Fagioli Soup. Rich, hearty and loaded with veggies and meat. A perfect, comforting soup for Fall!
Hi guys! It’s Kelley back from Chef Savvy! Today I am sharing one of my favorite soups: Pasta e Fagioli. This is comfort food at it’s best. Super hearty, meaty, thick Italian soup loaded with veggies, meat and beans.
Best of all this soup is made in a slow cooker. That means little to no prep time and lots of flavor. This soup simmers low and slow for 8 hours!
This soup takes just a bit of prep time and is super easy to throw together. I like to brown the meat for extra flavor and throw it into the slow cooker with the rest of the ingredients. I like to add in the pasta and beans about 30 minutes before serving. This ensures they are tender but not soggy.
Serve the soup with a side salad, crusty bread and dig in!
- 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
- 1 pound lean ground beef
- 2 whole carrots, diced
- 4 celery stalks, diced
- 1 medium onion, diced
- 28 ounce can crushed tomatoes
- 2 cans (14.5 ounces each) beef broth
- 2 whole bay leaves
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1 teaspoon dried basil
- ½ teaspoon dried thyme
- salt and pepper to taste (I added 1 tsp salt and ¼ teaspoon pepper)
- 1 can (15 ounces) cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
- 1 can (15 ounces) red kidney beans, drained and rinsed
- 1 cup ditalini pasta, uncooked
- Add olive oil to a large skillet and add in ground beef. Cook until browned and no longer pink.
- Place the beef in a slow cooker along with the rest of the ingredients except for the beans and pasta.
- Cook on low for 7-8 hours or high for 3-4 hours. 30 minutes before serving stir in beans and pasta.
- Season with salt and pepper to taste. Discard bay leaves before serving.
- Serve immediately while hot.
Looking for some more Slow Cooker Recipes? Here are a few of my favorites!
1. Mexican Slow Cooker Stuffed Peppers
4. Slow Cooker Asian Sesame Meatballs
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Kelley
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This is my favorite soup at Olive Garden, but I’ve never tried making it. Thanks for sharing! I’ll give it a try. 🙂
Hi, 2 cans of beef broth are enough?
We put an extra can of broth in to make it more like soup, less like stew.
Exactly, more broth needed. Also I used half Italian sausage and 1/2 ground beef. Also added garlic. Pretty darn good soup with these additions.
i would too, sounds excellent, going to make this next weekend and with crushed red pepper for a zing..
I use 2 large 32oz containers. 2 cans was not enough for me, doesn’t make enough soup.
What size crock pot does this fit in?
5 or 6 quart. 🙂
I hope that Mc Cormick recipes will come in my e-mail. I was looking for the slow cooker Thigh chicken and trio veggies recipe but can’t find it… Can you send it to me? Thank you so much.
I made this soup the other night and it came out more like a chili than a soup. I cooked on high for 4 hours instead of low for 8. What did I do wrong and what can I do to make it soupier?
Other things I did differently is that I prepared the ground beef a few nights in advance and refrigerated it until I was ready to make the soup. Also had chopped the veggies in advance and refrigerated, too. I threw all ingredients in the slow cooker as directed – adding the pasta and beans at about 3 1/2 hours into the cooking time.
exactly! this is not authentic pasta fagioli soup!!
You have that right….Italians do not put meat in Pasta e Fagioli
Yes…this is more like a chilli. I would add another 14oz of broth if you wanted it like a soup.
This recipe looks delicious. and I can’t wait to try it.
There is clearly an omission of garlic. This soup is very bland and, after looking at other recipes for this dish, I realized the garlic was missing!
I added garlic too!
Yes I added quite a bit of minced garlic. Cooking it now for the first time. I’m sure it will be good.
Has anyone made this with ground turkey or ground chicken instead of beef?
I think it would still work great!
I made it with ground turkey and used quinoa instead of pasta. It needed a lot more seasonings than stated. Garlic would have been a good add, as mentioned previously
Mine turned into more of a stew rather than a soup. I won’t be using this recipe again…
If I read this right, you add the cup of pasta and cook on “high” for 30 minutes. Or, you can add the pasta and cook on “low” for 30 minutes. Right?
I would think pasta addition 30 minutes on HI or 60 minutes on LO. Just my $0.02
Walter, the pasta only needs 30 min to cook at the end of the time even at low temp. Most pasta takes 20 min in boiling water for al dente. Longer than 30 min (at low or hi temp) would make it absorb more liquid & be mushy.
I make pasta separate and add to each bowl as served. Much better and pasta is al dente and not mushy.
We thought this soup was very yummy. I’m not sure I know enough about what Fagioli soup should taste like to compare to a true Fagioli, but as a soup it was delicious! My husband made several comments about making it again, which means he really like it. I will add an extra can of beef broth next time to make it soupier, or at least keep one on hand to add to the leftovers. The pasta soaks up a lot of the broth. All in all tasty and I’m making it again.
I have looked for a recipe for Pasta e Fagioli Soup for quite some time. I have tried several recipes. This one is by far the best. We thoroughly enjoyed it. The only change that I made was substituting spicy Italian sausage for the ground beef. Yum.
Yes, Italian sausage is a must, and garlic. I hate kidney beans, so I would just add two cans of cannolinni beans.
try pinto beans
i know olive garden has a soup called pasta fagiole similar to this and it looks yummy no doubt…but true pasta fagiole is just that..pasta and beans in a tomato based broth…this is more like minestrone…still good just not the traditional recipe 🙂 and i should know.my nonna made it all the time…there are variations but ours was meatless and basic peasant food 🙂
My Nonna made pasta fagiole they way your Nonna made it. This is interesting but I make a faster easier soup called 7-can soup. 1 lb ground beef crumbled and browned, drain. Add to large pot with 2 undrained can Minestrone Soup (I like Progresso), 2 cans pinto beans (I use Ranch Style Beans), 2 cans Stewed Tomatoes and 1 Can Rotel Original. Heat together and season with salt and pepper to taste… Yummy and fast!!!
I have make this soup a couple times and my husband LOVE IT!!! I do too….the only thing that I don’t make it in the slow cooker I make it in the regular pot (stove top) is ready in about an hour and comes out really good.
This was yummy!!!! I doubled the meat and the broth to make it more like soup and less like chili, will for sure make this again!!! 🙂
My family came from Bari, Italy. PASTA E FAGIOLE, simply translated , PASTA AND BEANS. Grandma made this a lot. Great northern beans, ditalini, onion, celery, chopped bacon, salt and pepper. That was the recipe she brought from home in Italy. I don’t know where the recipe came from with beef in it.
The beef is added to make it more hearty. This is a variation of olive garden.
I think next time I will leave out the pasta (it went mushy anyways), add some chill pepper and have a nice simple child.
I am vegan. Please let me know what to replace beef
You can always just leave it out. 🙂
To make it vegan, replace: beef stock with vegetable stock and ground beef with ground soy product. Also, make sure you use vegan (no egg/dairy) pasta. All other ingredients looked vegan to me. My daughter-in-law is vegan and this is how I would make it for her.
What do you mean you don’t eat no meat…. that’s ok, You can use lamb. 😉
Looks yummy! I am going to try it. I as a rule don’t put pasta in the crock pot but cook and keep it separately until serving. This prevents the pasta from getting mushy.
Just tried this today and it came out really good. I try to make a different home made soup every Friday for my friends and family and this one is now my go to soup.
I made this soup last night and it was a hit! Delicious!!! Can’t wait to have it again….and again!!!
I made this today with stew meat and it was PERFECTION!
I made this today with stew meat and it was PERFECTION!
I just made this tonight and it was a huge hit. Even my picky 6 year old loved it! I did use extra broth as other comments suggested. I will be adding this to my list of favorites 🙂
is the beef per-browned before add all other ingredients?
Yes it is browned before adding it to the soup.
Sorry I didn’t watch the video or read the instructions. I read through the ingredients 🙁
Is the nutritional info available for this soup?
I make a similar knock-off recipe from Olive Garden on the stove and it’s SO time consuming, so I can’t wait to try this one! Why do you have to brown the ground beef first before adding it to the crock pot? Won’t it cook fully in the crock pot? Or does it compromise the recipe somehow? I know when I make chili in the crock pot, the throw the ground beef in with everything else. Thanks!
I love Olive Garden’s Pasta e Fagoli. It reminds me of chili with the taste and when they serve it with less broth. I will give this a try. Since the beef is put in cooked, why does it take so long to cook?
Okay, i grew up having Pasta Fagiole during Lent, my mother was Italian and we never had meat, only ditalini and beans in a tomato sauce with fresh garlic and Basil, i now make it since my husband and i are both Italian with cannellini beans, &,red beans salt to taste, i add a few red pepper flakes for taste and a bay leaf or two. I cook my pasta separate drain and add just before serving. If making other then during lent i will brown some italian sausage for my husband and add.
I have never had it from the Olive Garden, i like the color the carrots give but they also add a little sweet, which may be good 🙂
I am Italian, I call it delicious!!!. I used corn instead of carrots because my family doesn’t like carrots, used veal, pork, and beef, because that’s all I had, and put a little red wine in it, well, red wine goes well with everything! It was incredible! This and bread, we ate it all weekend long. I had Olive Garden’s soup, this was better.
Could you please give nutritional info for the recipes, please….
Good but too much like a stew than a soup. Also I think the basil was a bit heavy. Probably cut it down to 1/2 tsp next time.
I was in a rush, so I cooked it on the stove. I had to add water, and I doubled the meat. I took your suggestion to leave the beans and pasta for last. It was so delicious! Thanks!
I used 32oz of beef stock, garlic and parmesan cheese. Came out pretty good.
Thank you Olive Garden…
Made this tonight for my sick fiancé, and she loved it! Super easy and very tasty, this will be going onto the “keeper” rotation. Thx!
I’ll cook the pasta separately and add to bowls. Too much starch from the pasta will thicken it like a stew. Making tomorrow.
That looks SO yummy. I am absolutely trying that!
Just went to a local Italian restaurant and had this soup for lunch. Their version was minus the meat and kidney beans but otherwise I could pretty much pick out the same ingredients as this recipe. It was delicious that way if you are a non-meat eater!
I add garbanzo beans cuz I love them!
I love them too!
This looks delicious! Do you know if it would freeze well? If so, any freezer tips? Thank you!