This flavorful healthy green chicken vegetable soup recipe is an easy soup recipe to make from scratch for your whole family! If you love this chicken soup as much as we do, you will want to check out all of my delicious homemade soup recipes!
Jump to:
At times like this, I need to kick myself into gear and get the sugar out of my system. I created several high protein, super healthy nutritious green soups as a way to kick-start a week of healthy eating.
Your whole family is going to love this gluten free chicken vegetable soup, but I do have one word of advice. Don't tell your kids this soup is healthy. I am all about stealthy ways go get nutrition into the kids so let them try it and let them form their own opinion :-).
This easy soup recipe is one of my favorites, not only because I feel good when I eat it, but one of my kids will actually eat it!! (My kids' mantra is "if it is green, I won't touch it.")
Luckily, I have lots of kid-friendly soup recipes on the blog like this Lentil Bacon Soup, and if you want to try a really special homemade soup, my Grandma's Homemade Chicken Soup From Scratch recipe.
This gluten free healthy soup recipe is full of all the good stuff, shredded chicken, carrots, greens, and more."
If I am not trying to "be good", I top this soup with crushed gluten free tortilla chips and about a tablespoon of cheddar cheese.
Substitutions and tips:
You can customize this soup easily to use the vegetables you have in your refrigerator. This soup is a great way to eliminate food waste by using up what you have compared to going to the grocery store to buy more.
- Look in your refrigerator, what vegetables are going bad soon? Toss it into the pot!
- Make brown rice and serve this soup over a quarter cup of rice.
- Use nutrient-dense kale instead of spinach
- When you pull the whole cooked chicken breasts out of the pot, put it on a cutting board. Use two forks to shred the chicken as shown below.
Best spices?
I love to mix up the flavors when I make chicken vegetable soup. For this soup, I kept it simple using cumin, chili powder, salt, and pepper. Sometimes I add minced garlic...you can customize the flavors your family loves best!
Instructions:
The first step in making this chicken vegetable soup recipe is to open your refrigerator and see what vegetables need to be used quickly. Carrots, greens like Swiss chard or spinach, potatoes, onions, green beans, corn. Grab what you have and chop it up!
Sauté the vegetables in a pan with a little olive oil over medium heat for 5-8 minutes to soften the vegetables. Pour the vegetables into a soup pot, add the raw chicken breasts, seasonings, broth, and water.
Cover the pot and bring to a boil. Reduce the temperature to low and simmer for an additional 20 minutes. Remove the chicken breasts to a cutting board.
How to shred chicken:
Shred the chicken, then add it back to the soup.
This is how I shred the cooked chicken with two forks...I use the two forks to pull apart the chicken into "shreds." You can also use special meat shredders to get the job done.
Here is the old photo of the soup...it is fun to see how far my food photography has come!
(*this post was updated from early in my blogging days 4/2014 with newer photos and more cooking instructions.)
I hope your family agrees, this is one of the best chicken vegetable soup recipes around. If you want to make an Instant Pot version of this soup, check out this Instant Pot Vegetable Soup With Shredded Chicken. You can also check out all of my Gluten Free Chicken Recipes too!
📖 Recipe
Healthy Chicken Vegetable Soup Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 raw chicken breasts
- 4 large carrots diced
- 2 zucchini chopped into small pieces
- 2 large heads of broccoli chopped
- 2 cups raw spinach sliced very thinly
- 2 ½ cups low sodium chicken broth I use a box of Trader Joe's
- 6 cups water
- 2 teaspoons chili powder more if you like it spicy
- 2 teaspoons cumin powder
- 1 ½ teaspoons salt more to taste
- ¾ teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- Optional sour cream
- Optional chives
Instructions
- In a pot, add oil and vegetables.
- Cook on medium heat until onions become translucent.
- Add chicken breasts, chicken broth, water, and spices.
- Boil for 30 minutes.
- Add chopped cilantro and cook for 15 more minutes.
- Remove chicken breasts and place on a cutting board or in a dish.
- If you want, you can use an immersion blender to puree all of the vegetables.
- Using two forks, shred the chicken breasts. (See photo below.)
- Add back into the soup.
- Serve with a dollop of sour cream and chives.
- (In addition to the sour cream and chives, I like to sprinkle crushed tortilla chips on top of this soup with some cheddar.)
Notes
SPECIAL NOTE
Please know that every gluten free flour blend has a different starch to grain ratio. If you use a blend I didn't test, you may need to adjust your moisture levels in your baked goods.
Nutrition
Nutrition Disclaimer
Nutritional information is an estimate provided to you as a courtesy. You should calculate the actual nutritional information with the products and brands you are using with your preferred nutritional calculator.
If you love the recipes you find on my blog, I would love for you to sign up for my newsletter (and get my free gluten free lemon dessert e-cookbook!)
Noelle
Great way to pack those veggies in! This was so warm and comforting loved it.
Sandi Gaertner
Thank you so much Noelle 🙂
Allison
This was the perfect recipe to get me back on track after several overly indulgent days. Thanks for sharing!
Sandi Gaertner
You are very welcome Allison 🙂