Creamy Chicken Tortellini Soup

This Creamy Chicken Tortellini Soup is one of the easiest dinners on my weekly meal plan in the fall and winter months. Flavorful rotisserie chicken, colorful soup vegetables and cheesy tortellini come together in a creamy garlic-parmesan broth – a quick recipe for cozy nights!

Ingredients I like to use, plus notes

Here is a visual overview of the ingredients in the recipe. Scroll down to the printable recipe card at the bottom of this post for quantities!

• Chicken: I like to use a rotisserie chicken, but I always buy the whole one and pick it apart RIGHT before I put it in the soup so it stays juicy. I also keep it in larger chunks, because it will fall apart a little as it heats through in the soup, and I really don’t like stringy chicken.
• Vegetables: I use ~3 cups of mixed soup vegetables – an equal mix of onion/carrot/celery is my favorite. However, you can skip any of them if you need to for preference or because you don’t have it on hand! Just use more of the others and it will be fine. I do recommend you don’t add solely carrot, because it makes a pretty sweet-tasting soup. Feel free to use store-bought mirepoix if you want to do zero chopping!
• Parmesan: I often grate my own, but feel free to use pre-grated here. It doesn’t make a big difference in the recipe, maybe it stays a little grittier but it’s fine.
• Spinach: Feel free to skip.
• Heavy cream: If you use something else, like half-and-half, make sure you do not skip the cornstarch! It helps stabilize the dairy, especially if you use a higher water content dairy in place of the heavy cream. Whole milk can be fine if you keep the temperature at a low simmer once you add it, but do not use anything with less fat content than that. Or you can add a tablespoon or two of cream cheese in place of the heavy cream if that’s all you have on hand!
• Tortellini: I like to use small tortellini in soup. You can use anything from 9 to 16oz tortellini, depending on appetites or how many people you want to feed. Just a heads up, if you do use 1lb of tortellini, it will be quite pasta-heavy.

How I make my Creamy Chicken Tortellini Soup

Let’s quickly walk through the steps I take to have this soup on the table in just 30 minutes – and I’ll share all of my tips and tricks so yours turns out like the pictures!

Side note, I really do photograph my family’s dinners for this little blog, and I don’t do any heavy food styling to keep things as real as possible because I want to share recipes that WORK for busy family life, not recipes that only look good on a screen!

Recipe walk-through/kitchen notes

• Sautéing the vegetables: Make sure to give the vegetables adequate time over medium to medium-high heat, so they fully soften without burning and without browning. This is the base of the recipe and it adds so much flavor!
• Adding the seasoning/flour: I know making a roux sounds and feels intimidating and often annoying. However, it doesn’t have to be. Make sure to keep the heat medium-low while you do this step and it will be fine. You only have to stir in the flour for a minute to get the raw taste out, it really is no big deal!
• Simmering: When you add the broth, stir well to incorporate all of the flour so the soup thickens as it simmers. You want to bring it to a boil once and then reduce to a decent simmer, cover and simmer for 5 minutes.
• Adding chicken and tortellini: I highly recommend keeping the chicken in larger chunks, it will fall apart a little in the soup. If your tortellini package says they take longer to cook than 5 minutes, add the chicken later so it doesn’t become stringy.
• Finishing the soup: Once the tortellini are tender, reduce the heat to a low simmer and add your corn starch/heavy cream slurry. The cornstarch helps to further thicken, and it also helps to stabilize the dairy, so it’s much less likely to curdle! After fully incorporating the cream mixture, you want to add the spinach and parmesan and keep the soup at a gentle simmer for 1-2 minutes to activate the cornstarch.

And that’s all there is to it! So easy, and if you’re a quick vegetable chopper, it’s on the table in 30 minutes. Check the seasoning before you serve it and adjust as needed, then serve it up with some bread for mopping up the broth 🙂

Serving ideas

Like I said, we don’t need much on the side here! Some bread and maybe some baby carrots or cucumber slices if I want to get extra vegetables in that day.

If you like a leafy green salad with your soup, I highly recommend dressing it with homemade Italian dressing or with white balsamic vinaigrette to go with this soup!

Our favorite bread we make weekly is my easy homemade bread, or my easy sourdough bread if there’s more time. I will say that I just as often buy bread at the store, even though my family are a bunch of bread snobs. Only so many hours in each day 🤷🏻‍♀️

More easy soup recipes

• Italian Sausage Gnocchi Soup
• Crockpot Chicken Gnocchi Soup
• Zuppa Toscana
• Pasta Fagioli Soup
• Sausage Tortellini Soup

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