Paleo Zuppa Toscana is a rich soup filled with potatoes, kale, Italian sausage and bacon. Your slow cooker makes this dairy free recipe easy to make.
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Paleo Zuppa Toscana Recipe
One of my favorite things to eat is soup. And something that I don’t fix very often is soup. I know it doesn’t make sense. For some reason, soup is generally not what comes to mind when I’m menu-planning. The one exception is when we are on a Whole30 or eating strictly paleo. Although I know there are a lot of unhealthy soups out there, soup in my mind equals healthy.
Copycat Olive Garden Zuppa Toscana Soup Recipe
This Paleo Zuppa Toscana is our grain free, gluten free, sugar free and dairy free version of one of our Olive Garden favorites. That creamy soup is my husband’s favorite and we realized how easy it is to make the Olive Garden soup recipe into a low carb soup that would be hearty enough and spicy enough to still bring smiles.
Zuppa Toscana Ingredients
Zuppa Toscana literally means “soup in the style of Tuscany”. This creamy Whole30 zuppa toscana soup is full of potatoes, Italian sausage, kale, onions, and most importantly, bacon.
Bacon makes everything better.
Except chocolate. I do not care for chocolate covered bacon. I’ll take my bacon and chocolate separate, thank you.
Sausage Soup Recipe
I used our own Italian sausage blend that you can find here. Homemade sausage seasoning is so much better than store-bought. Yes, it takes 5 minutes to throw the seasonings in a pound of ground meat, but the exploding flavor that will happen in your mouth is so worth it. Plus, you get to decide what type of “sausage” meat you use. Our favorite meat to add sausage seasoning to is ground turkey because it is so lean. I did a little bit of prep work the day before and got a pound of ground turkey seasoned and browned, so the next morning, it was all ready to throw in the slow cooker.
{And if you’re looking for homemade Italian seasoning mix? Try THIS!}
You can also prep the bacon ahead of time, too. Just a little bit of thinking ahead will make this an easy paleo sausage and kale soup to throw together on those early mornings.
Zuppa Toscana with Coconut Milk
One last thing before you head to the store to get the ingredients for this dairy free zuppa toscana soup. The recipe calls for coconut milk to make the soup creamy. If you don’t need the soup to be dairy free, you can add whole milk or half and half creamer instead.
The coconut cream (or regular milk) should be added at the very end of cooking. Make sure that your can of coconut milk are refrigerated and use only the solid white cream from the cans. Save the clear milky liquid for a smoothie or another recipe. Add the cream in, stir it into the soup a bit so it melts in and voila…you’ve got creamy soup!
Slow Cooker Zuppa Toscana
I like to double this recipe to fill my 5 quart slow cooker right to the top. That way we have plenty for leftovers. Meal prep can be hard, so having a soup recipe with lots of leftovers makes dinner the next day or even lunches a breeze.
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Paleo Zuppa Toscana
Ingredients
- 1 lb bacon cooked and crumbled
- 1 lb Italian sausage browned and drained
- 4 cups chicken stock
- 1 teaspoon minced garlic
- 1 medium onion diced
- 3 large potatoes peeled and cut into cubes
- 2 cups kale diced
- 1 can full fat coconut milk refrigerated
Instructions
- Place half of the cooked and crumbled bacon into the slow cooker. Reserve the other half as a topping for the soup.
- Add the Italian sausage, chicken stock, garlic, onion and potatoes to the slow cooker.
- Cover and simmer on low for 6-8 hours, or on high for 4-6 hours until the potatoes are tender.
- With 30 minutes left, add the kale to the slow cooker. Cover and allow the kale to cook for 30 minutes.
- Five minutes before serving, open the can of refrigerated coconut cream and add just the solid white cream to the slow cooker. Reserve the clear coconut milk for another use. Let the cream heat through the soup for about 5 minutes.
- Serve with crumbled bacon on top.
helen says
I made a double batch of this soup this morning and it is amazing! Tastes just like Olive Gardens version as Far as Ican remember. Had to cook it on the stove as it was too much for the slow cooker – took 40-50 min. I didnt peel the potatoes and it took 3 1/2 times the liquid to make a double recipe (I used 12 C chicken stock and 4 C water). I used ground pork and followed the linked Italian sausage recipe. i have made your sausage recipe 4 times and it is also awesome! I always put all of the spices for the sausage in my Ninja individual serve cup and pulse a few times. it makes it all into a powder that cooks more evenly. I also used another recipe to make my own Italian Seasoning blend – always nice to know whats in my food.
Julie Clark says
Wonderful!!! Thanks for your hints!
Debbie Voltz says
Absolutely love this recipe, thank you so much for sharing! This has become a family favorite and a regular in my meal planning rotation. I like to buy the sausage and bacon in advance, brown the sausage while the bacon cooks in the oven then bag them both up & toss in the freezer. This way when I decide to make the soup, the meat-prep is already done. I like to make it in my Instant Pot pressure cooker on the “Soup” setting, let the pressure release a bit, then add the kale to simmer for 30 minutes, then the cream.
Can’t say enough about how well done this recipe is, there are no changes needed, it is just perfect and so delicious!
Julie Clark says
I do that same thing…prepping the sausage and bacon ahead of time. It makes it so easy! Thanks for the Instant pot instructions. I’ll try this in there!
Hannah Helgerson says
SOOO delicious. My hubby loves the Olive a Garden version but this one is just as good if not better! Incredible flavor. We doubled the recipe so we could eat all week : Already looking forward to lunch tomorrow!
Jean Swisher says
Re. Your Zuppz Toscano soup, I use sweet Italian turkey sausage and cauliflower stems or the core and it is delious
Julie Clark says
Love these adaptations!
Ceelie says
This recipe was so delish! Subsituted cauliflower for the potatoes and you couldnt tell the difference. Thanks for the great recipe
Kelly says
Doesn’t the coconut milk make the soup sweet?
Julie Clark says
Nope! We use unsweetened coconut milk.
Teresa says
This Zuppa Toscana recipe is incredibly flavorful! When looking for new recipes, I look for ones that are 1) not complicated, 2) require ingredients that I have on hand or are easy to find at the local grocery store and do not drain our budget, and 3) prep does not require the use of every dish I own.
This recipe involves easy prep, minimal cleanup, and a delicious meal that was ready in under an hour! The butcher recommended mild Italian sausage, which was flavorful and allowed for me to determine the level of spiciness by adding perfect amount of red pepper for our liking. Also, I am a garlic lover, so I doubled the amount. My husband loved it as much as I did. I’ll definitely be making this again! Thanks for the great recipe!
Julie Clark says
What a fantastic review. Thank you!! I really appreciate it and am glad you liked it!
Marleigh says
Its funny. I’ve never been a huge soup eater. But I wanted to try something that I could freeze and reheat for days when I’m not feeling good or don’t want to cook. I stumbled across a recipe and then looked up the Paleo version which is how I found this. The verdict is in. It’s better than anything I could have bought premade. Flavorful, warm, hearty and comforting. It’s perfect. Thank you.
Julie Clark says
You are so kind!! Thank you so much!