A copycat version of everyone's favorite sausage, kale and potato soup. Comes together in 30 minutes, perfect for a chilly weeknight dinner. Both stovetop and Instant Pot directions included!
Zuppa Toscana
- Total Time: 35 minutes
- Yield: 6-8 1x
Description
A copycat version of everyone's favorite sausage, kale and potato soup. Comes together in 30 minutes, perfect for a chilly weeknight dinner. Both stovetop and Instant Pot instructions included!
Ingredients
- 2 teaspoons olive oil
- 1 lb sausage (I like spicy chicken or italian!)
- 1 medium white or yellow onion
- 3 garlic cloves
- ½ teaspoon dried oregano
- ½ teaspoon red pepper flakes (optional)
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
- ¼ cup white wine
- 1 lb baby red potatoes
- 4 cups chicken stock
- 2-4 cups water (see note below)
- 1 can evaporated milk OR ½ cup heavy cream
- 4-6 cups kale leaves
Instructions
Stovetop
- Heat a large pot over medium high heat and add 2 teaspoons olive oil. Once hot, add 1lb sausage (squeeze out of casings if you have sausage links) and break it up into big chunks. Let cook undisturbed for about a minute before stirring and breaking it into smaller chunks. Lower heat to medium and let cook, stirring/breaking occasionally, until brown and crispy.
- While sausage is cooking, dice 1 medium onion and mince 3 cloves garlic. Every once in a while, stir the sausage and make sure it's cooking evenly. When it's done, remove sausage from pan and set aside. Add onion to pot and cook for 5-7 minutes, stirring occasionally. If your sausage didn't give off too much fat, feel free to add a little more oil to keep the onions from sticking.
- While the onions cook, cut 1lb potatoes. The size is totally up to you, just remember the smaller you cut them the quicker they will cook!
- When the onions are translucent and just beginning to brown, add the garlic, ½ teaspoon oregano, ½ teaspoon red pepper flakes (if using), 1 teaspoon salt and ½ teaspoon pepper. Cook for one minute.
- Add ¼ cup wine and scrape up any brown bits at the bottom of the pan. Let cook for one minute.
- Then add the potatoes and sausage, along with 4 cups chicken stock and 2 cups water (up to 4 if you want a super brothy soup). Crank up the heat and bring the pot to a boil, then reduce it back to a simmer and let cook, uncovered, for 20 minutes or until the potatoes are totally cooked through.
- While the soup simmers cut or tear up 4-6 cups kale into small pieces. This feels annoying, but I promise it's more annoying to try and slurp up huge pieces of kale.
- When the potatoes are cooked, add 1 can evaporated milk (or ½ cup heavy cream) and kale to the pot and stir. Cover and let cook for 5 minutes.
- Taste and adjust seasoning as necessary (I almost always add more salt, but that depends on the sausage you use).
- Serve hot!
Instant Pot
- Turn Instant Pot to saute and add 2 teaspoons olive oil. Once hot, add 1lb sausage (squeeze out of casings if you have sausage links) and break it up into big chunks. Let cook undisturbed for about a minute before stirring and breaking it into smaller chunks. Lower heat to medium and let cook, stirring/breaking occasionally, until brown and crispy.
- While sausage is cooking, dice 1 medium onion and mince 3 cloves garlic. Every once in a while, stir the sausage and make sure it's cooking evenly.
- Add onion to pot and cook for 5-7 minutes, stirring occasionally. If your sausage didn't give off too much fat, feel free to add a little more oil to keep the onions from sticking.
- While the onions cook, cut 1lb potatoes. The size is totally up to you, just remember the smaller you cut them the quicker they will cook!
- When the onions are translucent and soft (they might not start to brown in the IP - that's okay!), add the garlic, ½ teaspoon oregano, ½ teaspoon red pepper flakes (if using), 1 teaspoon salt and ½ teaspoon pepper. Cook for one minute.
- Add ¼ cup wine and scrape up any brown bits at the bottom of the pan. Let cook for one minute.
- Add the potatoes and 4 cups chicken stock and 2 cups water (up to 4 if you want a super brothy soup).
- Switch Instant Pot to Pressure Cook. Cook on high for 5 minutes.
- While the soup pressure cooks, cut or tear up 4-6 cups kale into small pieces. This feels annoying, but I promise it's more annoying to try and slurp up huge pieces of kale.
- When done, do a quick release (this means you manually release the pressure when done, rather than allowing it to come down naturally) and switch back to saute mode.
- Add 1 can evaporated milk (or ½ cup heavy cream) and kale to the pot and stir. Let cook for a few minutes just until the kale wilts.
- Taste and adjust seasoning as necessary (I almost always add more salt, but that depends on the sausage you use).
- Serve hot!
Notes
- For whatever reason, I like this dish really soupy so I always use the full four cups of water. If you want to keep it less so then start with two and add more if you feel the need.
- A lot of the flavor comes from the sausage so use your favorite. I'm partial to spicy sausage and I like this soup on the spicier side, so I almost always go that route.
- With that said, if you want to make this vegetarian you can omit the sausage and add chickpeas or white beans. Both taste good - just make sure to add a little extra seasoning and taste as you go.
- I find that this soup keeps really well in the fridge for a few days so it's great to make a big batch over the weekend and eat throughout the week.
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Cook Time: 30 minutes
We all have that one dish. The one that we'll never stop making no matter what obstacles stand in our way. The one that feels comfortable and you can make in your sleep. The one that you make so often it (almost) feels as easy as ordering delivery. The one you can't quit even if you try. Zuppa Toscana is that for me.
I actually shared this recipe on v1 of this blog around five (!) years ago right before I moved to San Francisco (what turned out to the be the first of many cross-country moves, but still the biggest/scariest in my heart) and since then this version of Zuppa Toscana has continued to be the #1 most cooked thing in my kitchen(s).
Why Zuppa Toscana is the BEST soup
Dramatic, I know. But it truly is the most delicious soup...and I love pretty much all soup!
My love for this soup boils (ha!) down to one thing: Comfort. Honestly, it just tastes comfortable to me. Is that weird? It's probably weird. But I'm assuming you have some sort of food that invokes that feeling for you so I think you get it.
If not, then at the very least you get that I'm weird ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
There aren't a ton of ingredients, but together they are all perfect. Here's what you need:
Sausage: Aside from being the protein source in this, sausage is also a pretty major flavor agent. I like to use a hot/spicy variety, but sweet italian or mild work too! I often use chicken sausage and it turns out great. If you do use chicken or turkey sausage, you may have to add a little bit more oil to make up for the lack of fat.
Onions + garlic: Because of course.
Spices: My recipe calls for dried oregano and red pepper flakes (plus salt and pepper, duh). You can also throw in any of the following: dried thyme, dried basil or italian seasoning. If you happen to have fresh herbs, go for it! The only one I don't suggest is rosemary as the flavor can be a bit too strong here.
Potatoes: I like to use red baby potatoes, but you can also use regular-sized red potatoes, yukon golds or those tri-colored baby potatoes! I would not use russet for these, but to be honest, they will still absolutely work. Whatever kind of potato you use, make sure to cut them evenly and small enough to cook through in about 20 minutes.
Chicken stock: Actually, you'll need chicken stock AND water. The amount of water will depend on how brothy you like your soup (I like it very brothy, so I go heavy on the liquid). In general, about 6 cups of liquid will be great. I do the combo of stock and water, but you can go full chicken stock if you'd like!
Kale: In a weird way, the kale is my favorite part of this soup?? I can't explain it, but I love the greens here. Make sure to cut or tear the leaves fairly small so it's easy to eat.
Evaporated milk: Most Zuppa Toscana recipes call for heavy cream, and you can absolutely do that here too. But over the years I've found that I prefer the taste and texture of certain soups when I use evaporated milk over heavy cream or milk.
Like most of the recipes I share here, this one is pretty customizable and easy to put together. If you follow the recipe as written it should be a 30-ish minute meal as I've laid out a fairly efficient way of cooking here (cutting onions while sausage cooks, prepping kale while soup simmers, etc.). However, if you prefer to get all your things prepped before you start cooking I still think you will be in and out of the kitchen in way under an hour (both stovetop and Instant Pot versions!).
Stovetop vs Instant Pot
Both are great, but I do prefer stovetop with this soup. While it doesn't make a HUGE difference, I find that the saute function on the Instant Pot just doesn't brown things very well. And since there aren't a bunch of ingredients in this soup, a lot of the flavor comes from browning the sausage, and then cooking and slightly caramelizing the onions in that fat. On the stove you can definitely accomplish this, and because this is a pretty quick-cooking soup on it's own, the Instant Pot doesn't necessarily cut down on time that much either.
So why use an Instant Pot at all? Because sometimes you just need to, okay?! With the Instant Pot version, you don't have to worry about dirtying up the stove which is an actual big deal for me. The only change I make when pressure cooking is that I keep the sausage in the whole time vs. taking it out of the pan after browning on the stove. This is to help ensure that the sausage does actually flavor the soup in some way. Otherwise, the directions are pretty much the same! And it only has to pressure cook for 5 minutes (but remember to build in time for the thing to actually come to pressure)!
Note: I do a quick release with this because I find letting it naturally release can overcook both the sausage and potatoes. If you let it naturally release for a few minutes before manually doing the rest, that's totally fine. I just wouldn't let it go all the way naturally.
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