Slow Cooker Pasta Fagioli is one of our favorite comfort food meals! This soup recipe is perfect for using up your leftover ham and ham bone!
After we make our Glazed Baked Ham, or really any ham on the bone recipe, we save the leftover ham and ham bone for this comforting slow cooker soup! This soup recipe is definitely a meal in one, but if you’re looking for a little more, try serving this with a homemade Caesar Salad that with our favorite creamy Caesar Dressing!
Slow Cooker Pasta Fagioli Recipe
My mom always makes ham for the holidays. Except for Thanksgiving, that one is turkey, but most other holidays – it’s ham. Which makes my boys really happy because it’s one of their favorite things to eat.
I’ve mentioned before that Christie and I go prepared to my mom’s for Thanksgiving with our own large stock pot in hand…because we steal her turkey bones after dinner and bring them home to make Homemade Turkey Soup.
You can officially call yourself a foodie when you start to steal your family members leftover turkey carcass. Can’t deal with that going to waste – for one it’s an awesome dinner. For two it feeds my family for days, and with two growing boys (one who is bigger than me) I’m not letting a few days of food go to waste.
How Do You Make Slow Cooker Pasta Fagioli?
For this Slow Cooker Pasta Fagioli recipe, cut your onions just in half or in quarters and the celery into 4 big pieces each. You’re going to pick out the onions and celery when the soup is done so you don’t want to be fishing around for them. These aromatics are just for flavoring the stock.
Next get the ham bone in along with some herbs, seasonings, water and dried beans. If you don’t have or don’t want to use dried beans, you can add canned beans at the end of the recipe, but we really love the texture of dried beans for this soup recipe.
Now set your slow cooker on low for 8 hours and let it go to work.
Some of the beans will stay whole after the 8 hours and some will just fall apart. We want some of those mushy beans though, because they help thicken up the soup along with adding delicious flavor to the broth.
After 8 hours, take out the ham bone and remove the bay leaves, onions, carrots and celery. Dice the carrots into smaller, bite size pieces and add them back to the soup along with the reserved ham and cooked pasta.
Taste the pasta fagioli for seasonings and add any additional salt or pepper if needed – then dig in. Of course you’ll want to serve this pasta fagioli soup with lots of grated parmesan cheese and fresh black pepper.
This Slow Cooker Pasta Fagioli is definitely one of our favorite comfort food dinners, and it will feed your family with plenty of leftovers. Don’t forget a big loaf of crusty bread for dipping on the side!
Looking For More Soup Recipes?
- Navy Bean Soup with Ham
- Beefy Tomato Soup
- Slow Cooker Ham and Noodle Soup
- Pork Egg Roll Soup
- Slow Cooker Split Pea and Smoked Turkey Soup
- Stove Top Split Pea & Ham Soup
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Slow Cooker Pasta Fagioli
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 8 hours
- Total Time: 8 hours 10 minutes
- Yield: 8 servings 1x
Print Recipe
Pin RecipeThis slow cooker pasta fagioli is the perfect way to use your leftover ham bone from a holiday dinner! So comforting and hearty, this soup will feed your family for days!
Ingredients
- 1 ham bone, leftover from a 9-10 pound ham with ham left on the bone
- 1 lb. bag dried white beans
- 3 carrots, peeled and cut into large pieces
- 6 stalks celery, cut into 4 large pieces each
- 2 medium onions, peeled and cut into quarters
- 2 bay leaves
- 2 sprigs of fresh rosemary
- 1 tablespoon salt
- 8 cups water (See note)
- 3 cups cooked pasta such as elbows or ditalini
Instructions
- Trim any excess ham from the ham bone, you’ll need approximately 1 pound of ham for this recipe.
- Place all the ingredients except the pasta in a slow cooker and cook on low for 8 hours. If possible, stir the soup halfway through cooking to make sure the beans are down in the broth.
- Remove the ham bone, bay leaves, carrots, celery, onions and rosemary stems from the slow cooker, reserving the carrots.
- Dice the carrots into smaller pieces and return them to the slow cooker.
- Add the extra ham back into the slow cooker along with the cooked pasta.
- Taste the soup for seasonings and add any additional salt or pepper if needed. If the flavor of the broth is too strong, you can add a little more water until it is to your liking.
- Serve the soup with grated parmesan cheese and fresh pepper (optional)
Recipe Notes
If you don’t have dried beans, you can substitute canned beans. Just add them in during the last hour of cooking.
Adjust the water amount for the size of your crock pot and ham bone, you only want the water to just cover the ingredients, so you might need to add more or less. If you need more stock after the soup is cooked you can always add more water or chicken broth.
- Category: Soup
- Method: Slow Cooker
- Cuisine: American
Beautiful, warm, comforting, balanced, tasty. I’m in. Thank you and have a pleasant day !
Thank you Jan, you too!