This cozy and warming pastina soup features tiny pasta cooked in a flavorful, vegetarian broth, enriched with a medley of blended fresh vegetables like celery and carrots. Ready in just 30 minutes, top this delicious dish with freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano.
This humble yet comforting dish has been a staple in my kitchen for years, offering a taste of tradition and a comforting embrace with every spoonful! It’s my go-to healing soup for whenever anyone in my family is sick (along with my Creamy Tomato Soup).
Plus, this cozy vegetarian soup requires less than ten ingredients and comes together in just about 30 minutes, making it a no-brainer when it comes to simple vegetarian recipes.
This is also an amazing clean-out-the-fridge meal! It’s best to avoid vegetables in the Brassica family like broccoli, cabbage, and cauliflower as they may make your broth bitter, but any other veggies you have on hand can be added right to this soup!
Green tip: Use this soup as a clean out the fridge meal. Use up veggies in your fridge and blend them right into the soup. Just avoid broccoli, cabbage, and cauliflower as they may make the soup bitter, all other veggies are fair game!
In this recipe, you’ll learn how to make a nutritious and tasty veggie-packed broth by blending the vegetables into a puree and adding it back to the broth. You’ll also learn about pastina and my best tips for serving and storing vegetarian pastina soup!
As an advocate for green living, I’m always looking to reduce my consumption of ingredients that have a higher impact on our environment. This means I love creating meatless meals that are both flavorful and satisfying.
Green tip: Industrial meat production has a huge impact on the environment, especially because of the amount of land it takes to sustain and its high amount of greenhouse gas emissions. Reducing your meat consumption is one great way to reduce your ecological footprint.
Vegetable Pastina Soup Ingredients
Here’s everything you need:
- Vegetable broth. You can buy it at the store or make your own vegetable broth.
- Carrots. Two large carrots will do!
- Celery. Two stalks of celery is all you need.
- Onion. One small yellow onion will do the trick. You can sub in a sweet onion, red onion, or even shallots if you have those on hand.
- Garlic. Whole, peeled garlic cloves go a long way in this recipe. You’ll need four.
- Pastina. Or Acini de Pepe. Even orzo or couscous will work here!
- Parmigiano-Reggiano and black pepper. These are my two favorite finishing touches for serving this soup, but both are completely optional.
What kind of pasta is used for pastina?
Pastina is loosely translated as “small pasta”. There is a pasta shape that’s actually called pastina. It is the smallest pasta produced and is shaped like little stars. Still, you can often use pastina, Acini de pepe, orzo, and even couscous interchangeably.
Veggie Pastina Soup Tips and Tricks
Bring Your Vegetable Broth to a Boil First
Start by adding your vegetable broth to a large pot or Dutch oven over medium heat and bring it to a boil. This just speeds up the whole process!
Getting your broth going first gives you time to prep your veggies while that broth heats up.
Green tip: Organic farms rely on biodiversity to generate rich soil, avoiding the use of pesticides and fertilizers, which means no toxic runoff. Consider organic veggies if and when you can.
How to Prep Your Carrots for Soup
Veggie prep for this homemade veggie-packed soup is super simple. We will be pureeing the veggies so no need to dice or mince. We just want to make sure all of our vegetables are clean and an appropriate size to cook quickly.
Though your instincts may be to peel the carrots, there is no need to do so in the recipe. When we are making roasted carrots, recipes will often advise you to peel that carrots to get them nice and tender.
However, since we will be pureeing the vegetables, leave them on! The skins are packed with nutrients and when boiled and blended, will not have a tough texture.
Plus, using the most of our veggies and avoiding unnecessary scraps will help us reduce our kitchen waste!
How to Prep Your Celery for Pastina Soup
Similar to the carrots, we just want to clean up the celery to prep it for this cozy healing soup. Rinse it with water and cut off the leaves and the very tip of the opposite end of the stalk.
As you can see, the white part of my celery was starting to brown, so I chopped that off so I was left with a nice and clean piece of celery.
Once your celery is clean, chop it in half so that it cooks quickly in the boiling broth.
How to Easily Peel Your Onion
Chop both ends of the onion off so you can easily stand it up on your chopping board.
Then, slice it in half. At this point, you should easily be able to peel off the outermost paper-thin layer. And there you have it, your onion is prepped!
As with your carrot and celery scraps, you can save the ends and peels of the onion in the freezer to make your own vegetable broth from veggie scraps.
Alternatively, you can compost the scraps!
How to Easily Peel Your Garlic
The garlic can remain whole, but we do want to remove those paper-thin outer layers.
I find the easiest way to do so is by laying the garlic on my cutting board and using my bodyweight to push down on the garlic with the flat end of my knife.
This will crush the outer layer, breaking it apart and making it easier to peel. Once you remove those outer layers, your garlic is good to go!
Boil Your Vegetables in the Broth
Once your carrots, celery, onion, and garlic are prepped, carefully lower them into the boiling broth.
Cover and boil for 15 minutes to make the vegetables nice and tender and ready for blending into the puree.
Blend Your Veggies for a Hearty Vegetable Broth
After 15 minutes, remove the boiled vegetables and add them to a high-powered blender or food processor. Use a heat-safe cup with a spout (a Pyrex measuring cup works great here!) or a ladle to add about 1/4 cup of the broth to the blender as well.
Keep your broth boiling while you blend your veggies on high until it is free from lumps and turns into a nice, smooth puree. This will take a good 2-3 minutes to achieve.
Then, add the puree back to the boiling veggie broth and stir to combine. This will create a super flavorful, hearty broth.
How to Cook Pastina in Broth
Now it’s time to add your pastina!
What is pastina? Well, it’s the smallest pasta that is produced! In this recipe, star-shaped pastina can be used, or you can use Acini di pepe, which are tiny little round pieces of pasta.
Both make for the perfect addition to this cozy homemade soup. Recently, I’ve found that Acini di pepe has been more widely available, affordable, and easy to find, so that’s what I used here!
Add the pastina or Acini di pepe to the broth, stir, and cover, and cook for 8 minutes. Give it a stir halfway through to ensure it doesn’t stick to the bottom.
After 8 minutes, assess the consistency. If you want to thin it out a little bit, you can add up to an extra 1/2 cup of vegetable broth.
Serving Your Vegetable Pastina Soup
This Pastina Soup is absolutely delicious and filled with flavor as is! Still, my favorite way to serve this soup is finishing off the bowl with some freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano and some fresh cracked black pepper.
As for best accompaniments to this soup, here are some of my favorites:
- Arugula Burrata Salad with Basil Balsamic. A delightful salad featuring creamy burrata cheese, fresh arugula, and a drizzle of basil-infused balsamic vinaigrette.
- Pesto Butter Garlic Bread. Crispy bread slices slathered with a luscious blend of pesto, butter, and garlic, baked to golden perfection.
- Arugula Pear Salad. A refreshing salad combining peppery arugula, ripe pear slices, and a light vinaigrette for a harmonious blend of flavors.
How to Store and Reheat Leftover Soup with Pastina
In an airtight container in the fridge, this soup with pastina will last for up to 5 days. It can also be frozen for up to 3 months.
To reheat, you may want to add more vegetable broth. You’ll notice that the pastina will soak up even more broth as it sits in the fridge, and the ratio of broth to pastina for the leftovers may be off.
Reheat it in a pot on the stove over medium-high heat, covering and stirring occasionally until heated thoroughly. Alternatively, you can microwave the leftovers in a microwave-safe bowl and cover.
Microwave in two minute intervals, stirring in between until nice and hot all the way through.
Green tip: Of the billions of tons of food wasted annually, 50% of food waste happens at home. Reduce your contribution to food waste by properly storing and consuming leftovers.
Why You Should Make this Cozy Pastina Soup with Blended Veggies
- It’s hearty. The boil and blend technique with the vegetables makes for a uniquely hearty veggie-based broth.
- It’s cozy. This healing soup is truly like a warm hug in a bowl.
- It’s quick! This soup comes together in just about 30 minutes.
30-Minute Cozy Pastina Soup (Vegetarian)
PIN Print RATEEquipment
- Large Pot * or *
- High-Powered Blender * or *
Ingredients
- 6 cups vegetable broth (*see notes )
- 1 small yellow onion
- 4 cloves garlic
- 2 stalks celery
- 2 large carrots
- ½ pound pastina (or Acini de Pepe)
- 2 ounces fresh Parmigiano-Reggiano (optional for garnish)
- ½ teaspoon black pepper (optional for garnish)
Instructions
- In a large pot or Dutch oven, bring the vegetable broth to a boil. Meanwhile, clean all your veggies. Peel and half the onion, peel the garlic, and cut the ends off and half the celery stalks and carrots.
- Add the prepped vegetables to the boiling veggie broth. Cover and boil for 15 minutes.
- Remove the vegetables and add them to a blender with about ¼ cup of the broth.
- Blend until smooth and add the puree back to the boiling broth. Stir to combine.
- Add the pastina, cover, and boil for an additional 8 minutes, stirring halfway between. After 8 minutes, assess the consistency. If you want to thin out the broth, you can add up to an extra half cup
- Serve hot with freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano and black pepper. Enjoy!
Pro Tips
- * I recommend having an extra 1/2 cup or so of vegetable broth on hand just in case you want to thin out your soup after the pastina is cooked.
- Use this soup as a clean out the fridge meal! Use up veggies in your fridge and blend them right into the soup. Just avoid broccoli, cabbage and cauliflower as they may make the soup bitter, all other veggies are fair game!
- It’s hard to beat a good bowl of soup! Check out my most delicious selection of hearty soup recipes!
9 thoughts on “30-Minute Warming Pastina Soup”
Hi everything came out amazing except the pastina absorbed the entire pot of soup! I used the exact amount of all the ingredients. I put the uncooked pastina in the soup and cooked for 8 minutes. Let it sit while I cleaned up and ran some over to my friends house and by the time I got back it was all absorbed. What did I do wrong?
Hi Heather! The amount of broth will vary depending on the water content in the veggies you use and how much liquid cooks off while simmering, so this can totally happen without you doing anything wrong at all! Just add some extra broth at the very end to thin it out. Enjoy!!!
I’m currently fighting a cold and this soup seriously hit the spot! It’s delicious and comforting. I’m already excited for leftovers…this is for sure going into the rotation!
I’m so sorry you have a cold, but so glad this hit the spot! Thank you so much for taking the time to let me know!
This is delicious! I didn’t have any celery on hand so I threw in some spinach which did not end up producing a great color but was really tasty. Thanks for sharing!
I’m SO glad you enjoyed, Bridget! I’m always switching up the veggies I use in this soup to clean out my fridge- spinach sounds great! Thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback 🙂
This was so easy to make. The whole fam has a cold and this was so cozy, soothing, and delicious!! Perfect for the colder weather. We had purple and orange carrots on hand so it made the prettiest light purple colored broth lol. My son asked for lemon juice and that was a delicious addition when serving! Thanks for the recipe- it’s going to be a staple in our house for sure!!!
I’m so glad you enjoyed, Jenny!! The addition of lemon sounds PERFECT and I love that the purple carrots gave it a fun color. Thank you so much for taking the time to leave your feedback. Hope you’re all feeling better soon!
This is the coziest dish ever!! The broth has so much flavor and is effortless, will be on repeat in my house!