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Chicken Tortellini Soup (Stove Top or Slow Cooker)

Slow Cooker Chicken Tortellini Soup is your favorite chicken noodle soup but 1000X better with pillowy, cheese tortellini and super easy made in the crock pot! This Chicken Tortellini Soup is bursting with juicy chicken, cheesy tortellini and veggies in a steaming hot, savory, salty, perfectly seasoned broth that might leave you never wanting classic Chicken Noodle Soup ever again!
Prep Time 10 minutes
Cook Time 4 hours
Total Time 4 hours 10 minutes
Servings 8 -10

Ingredients

Instructions

Slow Cooker Instructions

  • Add uncut chicken to the bottom of a 6 qt. slow cooker, followed by vegetables. Add all of the remaining ingredients except for the tortellini. Give the top ingredients a stir. Cover and cook on low heat 6 - 7 hours or on high for 3-4 hours OR just until the chicken is tender enough to shred and the vegetables are tender.
  • Remove chicken to a cutting board and let rest for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, add tortellini to the slow cooker (turn to high heat if on low) and cook approximate 15 minutes. (DON'T add tortellini if you are not serving immediately, rather wait 15 minutes before you are going to serve).
  • Shred chicken and and add back to slow cooker with tortellini. Tortellini should be about cooked by this time. When tortellini is completely cooked, taste and add additional salt and pepper if desired (I like quite a bit more salt). For a less chunky soup, add additional chicken broth. Serve warm.

Stove Top Instructions

  • Heat one tablespoon olive oil in a large Dutch oven or stock pot over medium high heat. Once hot, add onions and cook 3 minutes. Add carrots, celery and garlic and cook an additional one minute.
  • Add chicken and all remaining ingredients EXCEPT tortellini and simmer until chicken is cooked through and tender, approximately 20-25 minutes.
  • Remove chicken to a cutting board and let rest for 10 minutes then shred.
  • Meanwhile, if your veggies aren’t fork tender, then continue to simmer the soup. Once tender, add tortellini and simmer just until tender, about 3-5 minutes. (DON'T add tortellini if you are not serving immediately, rather wait 5 minutes before you are going to serve to add and simmer).
  • Taste and add additional salt and pepper if desired (I like quite a bit more salt). For a less chunky soup, add additional chicken broth. Serve warm.

Notes

*It might seem like there is a lot of chicken stock while cooking, but it is needed to balance all the tortellini that is added at the end.
***You can mix up the type of tortellini you use.  I've even used sweet sausage and and it was amazing!
***You can buy a 9 oz. package of tortellini instead and half the recipe.  I suggest halving if you don't have a large crockpot or soup pot because it won't all fit!

HOW TO FREEZE

I don’t recommend freezing this Slow Cooker Chicken Tortellini Soup WITH the tortellini but you can freeze it without the tortellini (see details in post).
  • If you want to freeze this Slow Cooker Chicken Tortellini Soup to eat later, then it works great because you can make the soup, shred the chicken but DON’T add the tortellini.  Let the soup cool completely then freeze the soup and the tortellini separately.
  • If you want to make this soup, eat it, and freeze the leftovers, then there are two different ways to do this.  You can use one 9 oz. bag of tortellini (instead of 20 oz.) and add it directly to the soup then gobble up this tortellini in your soup servings before you freeze it (so there is no tortellini left to freeze).  Then simply reheat it with an additional 9 zo. bag of tortellini.
  • The other way is to boil your tortellini separately, add it to individual servings so you can freeze the soup and tortellini separately.