Creamy Lasagna Soup

Ingredients

Here’s a look at everything you need (for the most part):

Not pictured: olive oil, salt, pepper, lemon, basil, (+ an extra container of bone broth since you’ll need six cups)

While I picked up everything from Whole Foods, you should be able to easily find these ingredients at any grocery store.

Making the Soup

Everything comes together in one pot, or in my case, a 5.5-quart Dutch oven.

The recipe starts by browning mushrooms in olive oil before adding lean ground beef, onion, and seasonings. The beef is fully cooked and onion softened before bone broth goes in the pot along with broken lasagna noodles (or any pasta).

A cover goes on the pot and the soup is cooked for 10-12 minutes until the pasta is nearly cooked.

The soup is finished with some chopped basil or greens like chopped kale or spinach plus a creamy blended sauce made from great northern beans and ricotta.

It’s salted to taste then served with a big squeeze of lemon juice plus a little zest, freshly grated parmesan, some fresh herbs, and that’s about it.

Modification Ideas

A few thoughts on ingredient swaps and macronutrient adjustments.

Pasta

I’m coming off two soups (cheesy Italian and minestrone) made with Brami protein pasta, so my knee jerk recommendation would be adding more protein and fiber that way.

Aesthetically, I like the look of the lasagna ridges in this soup. But, and this might be my protein bro blindness, I think the drop off from traditional pasta to something like Brami (made with wheat + lupini beans) is not that steep.

Whole Milk Ricotta vs The Field

Using part skim ricotta might be a decent option for reducing fat/calories in the soup. Either ricotta needs to be blended, however. Otherwise you’ll never get rid of its grainy texture.

I’ve not tried using other “creamy” substitutes like cottage cheese for this lasagna soup. But I have used blended low fat cottage cheese to make things like gochujang broth. You just have to be careful not to add it when the soup is too hot or it can curdle.

If you want to test it out, swap it 1:1 for the ricotta in this recipe. I’d love to hear from you if you try it!

Leafy Greens?

Adding a few cups of baby spinach or shredded kale in place of the basil is a great way to pack more nutrients in the soup.

I’m just not the biggest fan of leftover wilted greens in soup. I recently experimented with chopping baby spinach really small in my marry me soup and found it helps. So you might give that a go.