What’s Inside Store-Bought Minestrone Soup?
Made with beans and vegetables, this soup should be good for you—but sodium often gets in the way
Comfort, convenience, healthfulness, and flavor are all reasons that consumers turn to soup from the supermarket. And though a steaming bowlful can deliver on all those attributes, finding soups that are both healthy and tasty is not so easy. “The main nutritional concern with packaged soups is sodium—soup is the fourth-largest source of sodium in the U.S. diet,” says Amy Keating, RD, a Consumer Reports nutritionist. “Yet many people think less salt means less flavor.”
But does it? CR’s nutrition experts evaluated the nutritional information for 15 packaged (canned, jarred, pouches, and refrigerated) minestrone soups—which should be good for you, given their combo of vegetables and beans. They eliminated the ones with the very highest sodium levels and chose nine low- to moderate-sodium soups for our sensory panel’s blind taste test (these ranged from 45 mg to 650 mg of sodium per cup). The chart below gives the nutritional information per one cup serving for all the soups we evaluated, listed alphabetically within each category.
“Even if it tastes amazing, you’re better off skipping soups with over 700 mg of sodium per cup (meaning the full can could be over 1,000 mg—about half the amount you should have in a day),” Keating says. And you can still get great-tasting soup with lower-sodium counts.
Here are our nutritionists' observations from CR's evaluation.
- Calories 110
- Total fat 1.5 g
- Saturated fat 0 g
- Carbohydrates 19 g
- Fiber 5 g
- Protein 5 g
- Sodium 510 mg
- Calories 100
- Total fat 2 g
- Saturated fat 0 g
- Carbohydrates 17 g
- Fiber 3 g
- Protein 4 g
- Sodium 630 mg
- Calories 330
- Total fat 16 g
- Saturated fat 2 g
- Carbohydrates 36 g
- Fiber 10 g
- Protein 11 g
- Sodium 530 mg
- Calories 120
- Total fat 3 g
- Saturated fat 0 g
- Carbohydrates 18 g
- Fiber 4 g
- Protein 4 g
- Sodium 270 mg
- Calories 100
- Total fat 1.5 g
- Saturated fat 0.5 g
- Carbohydrates 18 g
- Fiber 3 g
- Protein 4 g
- Sodium 650 mg
- Calories 110
- Total fat 2 g
- Saturated fat 0.5 g
- Carbohydrates 18 g
- Fiber 5 g
- Protein 4 g
- Sodium 640 mg
- Calories 100
- Total fat 2 g
- Saturated fat 0 g
- Carbohydrates 18 g
- Fiber 3 g
- Protein 4 g
- Sodium 45 mg
- Calories 120
- Total fat 2.5 g
- Saturated fat 0 g
- Carbohydrates 21 g
- Fiber 4 g
- Protein 5 g
- Sodium 480 mg
- Calories 110
- Total fat 1.5 g
- Saturated fat 0 g
- Carbohydrates 20 g
- Fiber 5 g
- Protein 5 g
- Sodium 55 mg
(Sodium above our cutoff.)
- Calories 120
- Total fat 3 g
- Saturated fat 0 g
- Carbohydrates 18 g
- Fiber 4 g
- Protein 4 g
- Sodium 690 mg
- Calories 170
- Total fat 4.5 g
- Saturated fat 0 g
- Carbohydrates 27 g
- Fiber 5 g
- Protein 7 g
- Sodium 770 mg
- Calories 110
- Total fat 2 g
- Saturated fat 0 g
- Carbohydrates 20 g
- Fiber 4 g
- Protein 5 g
- Sodium 690 mg
- Calories 100
- Total fat 0.5 g
- Saturated fat 0 g
- Carbohydrates 20 g
- Fiber 3 g
- Protein 3 g
- Sodium 1030 mg
- Calories 90
- Total fat 3 g
- Saturated fat 0 g
- Carbohydrates 12 g
- Fiber 3 g
- Protein 3 g
- Sodium 910 mg
- Calories 130
- Total fat 2.5 g
- Saturated fat 0.5 g
- Carbohydrates 21 g
- Fiber 4 g
- Protein 6 g
- Sodium 770 mg
John Walsh/ Consumer Reports John Walsh/ Consumer Reports
CR's Easy Minestrone
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
3 carrots, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
½ teaspoon dried oregano
½ tsp dried thyme
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon ground black pepper
1 (28 ounce) can no salt added crushed tomatoes
3 cups low sodium chicken or vegetable broth
2 cups water
1 (15 ounce) can no salt added chickpeas, drained
1 (15 ounce) can no salt added kidney beans, drained
1 small zucchini, chopped
1 cup green beans, cut into 1-inch pieces
4 ounces ditalini pasta, cooked according to package directions
4 cups fresh spinach
¼ cup grated Parmesan cheese
¼ cup chopped fresh parsley
Directions
1. Add the oil, onion, celery, carrots, and garlic to a multi-cooker on Sauté mode or a traditional large pot on the stove top. Stir and sauté the ingredients for 5 minutes. Stir in oregano, thyme, salt and pepper. Cook until fragrant, about 1 minute.
2. Add the tomatoes, broth, water, chickpeas, kidney beans, zucchini, and green beans. For multi-cooker: Close the lid with the vent in sealing position. Change the setting to Pressure mode. Set the timer for 5 minutes. When the multi-cooker beeps, do a quick pressure release according to manufacturer’s directions. For stovetop: bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low and simmer, stirring occasionally, 30 to 35 minutes, or until the vegetables are tender.
3. Stir in the spinach until wilted, about 1 minute; add cooked pasta. Serve topped with the Parmesan cheese and parsley.
Makes about 10 servings
Nutritional information per 1 cup serving: 210 calories, 4 g fat, 0.5 g saturated fat, 33 g carbs, 9 g fiber, 10 g protein, 190 mg sodium
Editor's Note: This article also appeared in the February 2021 issue of Consumer Reports magazine.
