Pasta e Fagioli Soup (Olive Garden-Inspired)

Restaurant-style pasta e fagioli sits halfway between a soup and a stew: a tomato and beef broth thick enough to coat a spoon, with browned ground beef, two kinds of beans, small ditalini, and diced carrot and celery in every ladle. This version is a homemade interpretation of the soup served at Olive Garden. It is not the restaurant’s recipe and doesn’t claim to match it; it simply follows the same idea with ingredients from a regular grocery store. It makes about 12 cups in one Dutch oven, enough for 6 generous or 8 standard bowls.

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What Makes This Version Work

Pasta e fagioli means “pasta and beans,” and Italian home versions are often meatless and thickened with mashed beans. The American restaurant style adds ground beef and leans on tomato sauce for body. Three choices keep this pot balanced:

• Two beans, added late. Red kidney beans and pale cannellini go in for the last stretch so they heat through and stay whole, which keeps the two colors easy to tell apart in the bowl.
• Pasta cooked in the pot, with a plan for leftovers. The ditalini thickens the broth as it cooks. If you expect leftovers, there is a separate-pasta method below.
• Salt last. Canned tomatoes, tomato sauce, and beef broth all bring salt, so most of the added salt waits until the end.

Ingredients, and What to Buy

Ground beef: Lean beef (90% lean or higher) browns well and leaves only a little fat to pour off. With 80/20 beef you will drain off much more.

Vegetables: Dice the onion, carrots, and celery to about 1/4 to 1/2 inch, close to the size of the beans and pasta. Pieces in that range are fully tender by the time the ditalini is done; larger chunks of carrot can still be firm.

Tomatoes: One 14.5-ounce can of diced tomatoes with their juice, one 15-ounce can of plain tomato sauce, and a tablespoon of tomato paste. The paste is cooked briefly with the garlic to take away its raw edge.

Broth and water: Use low-sodium beef broth. The cup of water is a starting point; the pasta drinks liquid as it cooks, so keep extra water or broth nearby.

Beans: One 15-ounce can each of red kidney beans and cannellini, drained and rinsed. Rinsing removes the starchy, salty canning liquid that would cloud and thicken the soup. Great Northern beans can stand in for cannellini.

Ditalini: One cup of dry ditalini (about 4 to 5 ounces). These short, hollow tubes match the size of everything else in the pot. Small shells are the closest substitute; long or large shapes don’t suit this soup.

Herbs and finish: Dried basil, oregano, and thyme, garlic powder, black pepper, one bay leaf, chopped fresh parsley, and grated Parmesan for serving if you like it.

Making Pasta e Fagioli

Brown the beef and build the base

Heat the oil in a 5- to 6-quart Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add the beef and break it into small crumbles as it cooks, about 7 to 8 minutes, until no pink remains and some bits are browned. Spoon off the excess fat, leaving about a tablespoon in the pot. Add the onion, carrots, and celery and cook, stirring, for 5 to 6 minutes, until the onion turns translucent and the vegetables begin to soften. Stir in the garlic and tomato paste and cook for about 1 minute, until the paste darkens slightly.

Simmer the broth, then add the beans

Add the diced tomatoes with their juice, the tomato sauce, broth, water, basil, oregano, thyme, garlic powder, pepper, the bay leaf, and 1/2 teaspoon of the salt. Bring it to a boil, which takes about 8 minutes, then lower the heat and simmer, partly covered, for 12 to 15 minutes so the carrots soften and the herbs flavor the broth. Stir in both beans and simmer gently for 5 minutes. Stir gently from here on; cannellini break more easily than kidney beans.

Cook the ditalini in the pot

Raise the heat to a steady simmer and stir in the ditalini. Cook, uncovered, for 8 to 10 minutes, stirring every couple of minutes so the pasta doesn’t settle and stick to the bottom. Start tasting a minute before the package time: the pasta should be tender with a slight bite, because it keeps softening in the hot soup.

Adjust and finish

Check the thickness. It should be moderately thick but still clearly a soup that pours from a ladle. If it has tightened too much, stir in hot water or broth, 1/4 cup at a time. Remove the bay leaf, stir in most of the parsley, and taste. Add the rest of the salt only if it needs it, then serve.

Getting the Thickness Right

The pasta keeps absorbing liquid as long as it sits in the broth. One cup of dry ditalini takes up roughly a cup of liquid while it cooks and continues after the heat is off, so a pot that looks right at the stove can be noticeably thicker 15 minutes later. That is normal. Loosen it with a splash of hot water or broth just before serving. Leftovers thicken further overnight, often into something closer to a stew, so plan on adding about 1/4 cup of liquid per bowl when you reheat.

Serving

Ladle it into deep bowls and top with the remaining parsley and, if you like, a spoonful of grated Parmesan. Crusty bread or a green salad rounds out the meal. For a vegetable-heavy beef soup with potatoes and a thinner broth, try our old-fashioned vegetable beef soup. If you want a meatless pot of beans, the cowboy bean soup is a smoky vegetarian option. More cold-weather ideas are in our fall soup recipes and the soups section.

Leftovers and the Separate-Pasta Method

If you are cooking for the week or plan to freeze some, keep the pasta out of the pot. Make the soup through the bean step, leaving out the cup of water at first. Cook the ditalini separately in salted boiling water for about a minute less than the package says, drain it, and toss it with a little olive oil. Store the soup and the pasta in separate containers and combine them in each bowl as you reheat. The pasta stays firmer and the broth stays soupy.

• Refrigerate: Cool and refrigerate within 2 hours, covered, for up to 4 days.
• Reheat: Warm on the stove over medium-low heat until steaming hot throughout, adding water or broth to loosen it.
• Freeze: Freeze the soup without pasta for up to 3 months. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator and add freshly cooked ditalini when you reheat. Soup frozen with the pasta in it works, but the pasta turns soft.

Questions About Pasta e Fagioli

Is this the official Olive Garden recipe?

No. It is a homemade interpretation inspired by the restaurant soup, built from common grocery ingredients. The restaurant’s recipe isn’t public, so no home version can claim to be an exact copy.

Why is it sometimes called “pasta fazool”?

“Fazool” comes from the way the word fagioli is pronounced in some southern Italian dialects, and it became the common Italian-American nickname for the soup.

Can I use a different pasta?

Small shells or tubetti work at the same timing. Avoid long pasta and large shapes, which crowd the beans and drink up more broth.

How do I keep it from getting too salty?

Use low-sodium broth, rinse the beans, add only half the salt at the start, and taste at the end. Parmesan adds salt too, so season with that in mind.

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