Pesto kale and white bean soup with pasta shells. Satisfying, creamy, bright, flavorful and easy to make. Healthy vegan vegetable soup recipe.
I think soup has to be one of my favorite meals to make, especially in the winter time. No matter what I have on hand, even if it’s the sad, empty-fridge day before my weekly grocery haul, I can always seem to scrounge up enough ingredients to make a soup.
Cooking soup is also a great way to use up those vegetables that you need to eat, and fast, before they go bad. Especially vegetables like zucchini, which ALWAYS seem to go bad in my house because no matter how hard I try, I can’t seem to get myself to eat that damn vegetable.
If you love white bean recipes, check out this Easy Vegan White Bean Chili and this Vegan Tuscan White Bean Soup next!
I’ve made this soup a few times now and I’m always pleasantly surprised with the flavor of the broth. It’s bright and creamy thanks to our friend tahini! I know, what a weird thing to put in soup broth. But I swear to the kitten god that it’s incredible.
I don’t enjoy vegetable soups unless there is some sort of fat element. I’m not talking oil-overload, just a hint of something: Topped with avocado, a tablespoon of oil, just something!
Otherwise, vegetable soups leave me feeling ravenous and empty just minutes after I eat. The fat helps make you feel satisfied and it also aids the absorption of the fat soluble nutrients in certain vegetables.
The broth of this soup is a pesto tahini sauce that I blend and then add in right before serving. Adding in the pesto tahini sauce at the end helps to keep the basil, garlic and lemon notes nice and fresh.
I also decided to add some whole wheat pasta shells. I love soups that have pasta in them. Give me a good Minestrone any day (plus I can get rid of my zucchini! ha!)
Tips for making this soup:
Use whatever vegetables you have in your fridge that you need to use up. But make sure you have at least onion and kale
If you don’t have tahini on hand, you can substitute for olive oil, almond butter, raw cashews or of course pine nuts
You can also make this recipe in a pressure cooker. Just add everything except the pesto mixture and cook for 20 minutes. Add the pesto mixture right before serving
This soup tastes even better the next day, once all the flavors have had a chance to mingle
This is my new favorite soup. It’s also very beautiful and colorful. I absolutely love all the bright colors of vegetables. They’re so mesmerizing. That’s why I named it Pesto Rainbow Vegetable Soup! It’s so very colorful.
Give this soup a whirl and please let me know how you liked it!
More recipes to try
- Dairy free pesto pasta
- Vegan beef stew
- Vegan minestrone soup
- Dairy free Alfredo sauce
- Vegan pot roast
- Kale tahini salad
📖 Recipe
Pesto white bean and kale soup
Ingredients
Tahini pesto sauce
- Handful of fresh basil (1 small container)
- ¼ teaspoon of salt
- 3 tablespoon tahini
- 3 cloves of garlic
- 1 small lemon - juiced
- 2 tablespoon nutritional yeast
- Splash of water if needed
White bean and kale soup
- 2 medium carrots - diced
- 1 medium red onion - diced
- 1 red bell pepper -diced
- 2 celery stalks - diced
- 1 veggie bouillon cube
- ½ cup pasta shells
- 6 cups of water
- 1 teaspoon dill
- 1 large bay leaf
- 16 oz can of great northern beans or chickpeas - drained and rinsed
- 2 handfuls of chopped kale
- salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
Tahini pesto sauce
- Blend all of the ingredients until smooth. Add a splash of water if needed. Set this aside, we will add it into the soup at the very end
White bean and kale soup
- Heat a large soup pan on medium and add 1 TBL of oil
- Once pan is heated, sauté the onions, carrot, bell pepper and celery for about 5 minutes or until veggies become a little translucent and slightly caramelized
- Add the 6 cups of water, bay leaf, bouillon cube and dill
- Cover and bring to a boil then turn heat to medium and simmer for 10 minutes
- Add the pasta shells and simmer for another 10 minutes
- Add the kale, white beans and tahini pesto and stir
- Simmer for 2-3 minutes or until kale is wilted
- Taste the soup and season as needed, add a little more water if needed as well
- Turn off heat and let the soup sit for 5 minutes before serving. This soup tastes even better the next day
Video
Nutrition
The nutritional information on this website is only an estimate and is provided for convenience and as a courtesy only. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed. It should not be used as a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
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