This popular and easy Italian Sausage and Cabbage soup recipe is a delicious meal-in-a-bowl that is gluten-free, keto, and Whole30 compatible!
This sausage and cabbage soup was born out of convenience and the onset of chilly weather!
This past weekend, we had pretty much no groceries left in the house except for a head of cabbage, some carrots, and a couple of packages of Italian Sausage in the freezer. Since I always have garlic, onions, and canned tomatoes of some sort in my pantry, I am not counting those.
I had the idea to make this soup a while ago but I always imagined fresh parsley as part of the equation. When I realized that all I had left in my house were these ingredients (except for the parsley!), I decided to go for it anyway.
This is a hearty winter soup, loaded with vegetables and sausage in every bite. Mild in flavor but with a nice balance from the tomatoes, this will please everyone in the family and is kid-approved!
Since I prefer a bit of heat, I like to sprinkle some crushed red pepper flakes on mine but that is totally optional. If everyone you are serving likes a bit of heat, I highly recommend using spicy Italian sausage in place of the mild sausage!
Sausage and Cabbage Soup Ingredients:
- Mild Italian Sausage
- Olive Oil
- Yellow Onion
- Garlic
- Carrots
- Green Cabbage
- Spices (Salt, Pepper, Crushed Red Pepper Flakes)
- Canned Unsalted Diced Tomatoes
- Chicken Stock
Recipe Tips:
- What is Bulk Sausage? Bulk sausage is another way of saying “loose sausage” or sausage outside of casings. If you can only find Italian sausage in casings, make sure that it is uncooked. Use a paring knife to slice a slit down the length of the uncooked sausage, remove the casings and crumble into a bowl. On that note, whatever type of sausage you buy, make sure it is gluten-free, MSG-free, and free of anything artificial.
- To save time, buy already shredded green cabbage!
- You can substitute red cabbage but just know that the color of the soup will be purple.
- Substitute Spicy or Hot Italian Sausage for a kick and omit the optional crushed red pepper flakes.
- If you want to use Italian seasoned Chicken or Turkey Sausage, I suggest adding an additional Tablespoon of olive oil and using it for sauteeing the Chicken Sausage.
- This sausage and cabbage soup freezes and reheats GREAT.
- To reheat: place defrosted OR frozen soup in a pot, cover, and cook over medium-low heat until warmed through.
More Gluten-Free Cabbage Recipes:
Roasted Vegetable Soup with Cabbage
Did you make this recipe? Please give it a star rating below!
This popular and easy Italian Sausage and Cabbage soup recipe is a delicious meal-in-a-bowl that is gluten-free, keto, and Whole30 compatible!
- 1.5 pounds bulk mild Italian sausage crumbled
- 1.5 Tablespoons olive oil
- 1 large yellow onion halved and thinly sliced
- 6 medium cloves garlic finely chopped
- 4 medium carrots peeled and cut into 1/4" rounds
- 2 pounds green cabbage core removed and shredded
- 2 teaspoons kosher salt plus a few pinches for cooking
- 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 28 ounce can of diced tomatoes unsalted
- 6 cups chicken stock or broth
- crushed red pepper flakes for serving optional
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Crumble sausage into a bowl and set aside.
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Peel, halve, and thinly slice onion. Finely chop garlic. Peel carrots and cut into 1/4" rounds.
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Remove core from cabbage and shred. I used the food processor with the shredding blade inserted. Alternately, you could cut the cabbage into very thin slices.
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Heat a large soup pot over medium heat. Once hot, add crumbled sausage. Cook, stirring occasionally, mostly to break up the sausage with a wooden spoon, for 8 to 10 minutes, or until most of the pink is gone.
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Remove sausage from pot and set aside.
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Keep the pot over medium heat and add olive oil. Once hot, toss in sliced onions along with a pinch of kosher salt and a couple turns of freshly ground pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, for 6 to 8 minutes, until onions are soft.
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Add in garlic and carrots, stir continuously for 1 minute until garlic is fragrant.
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Raise heat to medium-high and add in cabbage along with 2 teaspoons of kosher salt and 1/2 teaspoon of freshly ground black pepper. Toss to combine and continue cooking for 5 minutes, stirring frequently, until cabbage begins to wilt and release some moisture.
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Add cooked sausage back in along with diced tomatoes and broth. Bring to a boil.
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Once boiling, cover and reduce heat to a simmer. Simmer for 15 to 20 minutes, remove from heat and adjust seasonings if necessary. Serve with a sprinkle of crushed red pepper flakes and Enjoy!
- What is Bulk Sausage? Bulk sausage is another way of saying "loose sausage" or sausage outside of casings. If you can only find Italian sausage in casings, make sure that it is uncooked. Use a paring knife to slice a slit down the length of the uncooked sausage, remove the casings and crumble into a bowl. On that note, whatever type of sausage you buy, make sure it is gluten-free, MSG-free, and free of anything artificial.
- To save time, buy already shredded green cabbage!
- You can substitute red cabbage but just know that the color of the soup will be purple.
- Substitute Spicy or Hot Italian Sausage for a kick and omit the optional crushed red pepper flakes.
- If you want to use Italian seasoned Chicken or Turkey Sausage, I suggest adding an additional Tablespoon of olive oil and using it for sauteeing the Chicken Sausage.
- This sausage and cabbage soup freezes and reheats GREAT.
- To reheat: place defrosted OR frozen soup in a pot, cover, and cook over medium-low heat until warmed through.
Did you make this recipe? Tag @EverydayMaven on Instagram with the hashtag #EveryDayMaven and please give a star rating below.
UPDATE NOTES: This sausage and cabbage soup recipe was originally published in February 2014 and was most recently updated in October 2020.
Amazing as is but I also prefer the heat of the Hot Italian sausage and heave shake of Italian seasoning
I usually do mild for my kids but I am with you on the hot sausage – that is almost always my preference!
I made this soup with spicy Italian sausage and beef stock since I didn’t have chicken stock. It came out wonderfully! It is a cold and blustery east coast day and so worth it!!
Hi Barbara! That sounds amazing and perfect for a cold day 🙂
delicious soup, made it w/out the sausage, did not have any, added beans and it was perfect, thank you for sharing your recipes.
Awesome Marcy! So happy you liked it without the sausage 🙂
haven’t made the soup yet, but intend to.
with addition of white beans.
but, RIDICULOUS amount of sodium. Will be eliminating that!
No need to salt shame. We all adjust accordingly to our taste. Wonderful recipe.thank you for sharing, EDM. By reducing the broth the result is more of a stew.
Well said Sheila! Hope you love it!
I’m going to make this tomorrow, looks delicious! Do you discard the fat from the sausage after browning or is it used in the soup?
Hey Scott! I don’t unless the sausage is SUPER fatty!
Just made this tonight. Absolutely gorgeous! Thank for this delicious soup that goes so well with a snowy winter night in northern Canada. Mmmm.
Love it!!! It’s another crazy cold night here – I need to make a batch asap!
This soup sounds amazing! Any idea whether or not it could be prepped and cooked in the crockpot? Any idea how long in crockpot? I didn’t know if the cabbage was more mush or crisp in the soup so unsure how long to trial in the crockpot if I go that route? Thanks in advance!
Hey Jenny – YES! I have made this in the slow cooker and it’s excellent. I would do 4 hours on low (but recommend browing the onion / meat first to add a layer of flavor)
I have made this soup before… I’m sure I modified it in some way because I am a bit impulsive and would in the kitchen but I want to say I found it so memorable I have spent the past hour digging around the internet to find it again! This soup is absolutely fantastic! Everyone I feed it to last winter was head over heels for it!
Yay Laila!! So glad you found it again. Make sure you subscribed to recipes so you are on my list. There is a box to sign up on my homepage 🙂
This is my go to recipe, it is delish! The leftovers are amazing! Although it is paleo, I serve it with a crusty baguette & pasture butter!
This is on my menu for later this week – can’t wait!!!!
I never comment on recipes, but this is my absolute favorite soup recipe ever. Best Paleo recipe that I’ve found too. This is delicious and hearty, it feels like a cheat. I do add mushrooms to mine. Amazing!!!
Wow! What an amazing comment Stace! DAY MADE and thanks for taking the time to let me know 🙂
A heartfelt thank you for sharing this awesome soup, which has become a true staple in our home. Now, instead of dreading the arrival of cabbage in our CSA – which comes early and often – we both look forward to it.
I use spicy chicken sausage and add a squirt of Sriracha at the end, which gives it a great kick. Thank you for this glorious (and easy) recipe!
Love an extra kick with Sriracha! So glad you love this 🙂
I was reading another blog post yesterday (Peanut Butter Fingers) and came across a link to this recipe. It was perfect timing since it was a cold and rainy day here in Boston. I had a a bag of coleslaw I needed to use up as well as some ground beef and ground sausage in the freezer which went in. It was a delicious soup and we froze the rest for a couple of other meals (after my husband went back for seconds!). Thanks for a great recipe!
Fantastic Amanda! So glad you loved it and nothing better than a stocked freezer 🙂
I made this for dinner for my husband and I, and we both loved it and will definitely be making it again! He doesn’t like tomatoes in soup so I added some potatoes instead, and increased the stock to make up the needed liquid. Also used Italian hot sausage. It was delicious, hearty and filling and very tasty. Thanks for the great recipe!
Love this with hot sausage. So glad you both liked it Michelle!
Wize! I added small red potatoes, cut in quarters and partially cooked in Chicken Broth, which I’ll add back as needed.
Two questions– I have Jimmy Dean pork sausage (no casing) defrosted. Think that’ll work?
Also, does this freeze well? We can never get through a whole pot of soup, as hard as I try 🙂
It should work and yes, it freezes GREAT!
My adult son came down with a terrible cold and I was going to make chicken soup for him. I had this in the freezer so I defrosted it for myself. He claims to hate cabbage but heated some of this up for himself and declared, “This stuff is a treasure.” He claims the spiciness (when I made it all I had was hot Italian sausage so I used that) and soup quality helped him become unstuffed better than anything. Forget the chicken soup, I have to go get another head of cabbage. Thank you so much. With my son loving this cabbage soup and my being already hooked, this will become a healthy soup for both of us. As a type 2 diabetic, it’s the bomb.
Hi Sandy! Thank you so much for taking the time to comment and let me know how much you guys are both enjoying the soup! Tell your son I’m glad he is feeling better 🙂
I liked but didn’t love this soup at first. But tonight I added some chopped baby spinach and a splash of lemon juice, and it was fantastic! Next time I’ll leave the sausage in a bit bigger pieces, but it’s definitely a keeper. Delicious, healthy and filling. Thank you so much!
I made a nice big pot of this today, with a few changes. I cooked the onions and carrots at the same time, along with some celery. While I was waiting for it to cook down I added some chopped mushrooms I had lying around. I think they made the base even better. Also I’m a garlic lover, so as usual, I used extra.
For broth, I used some homemade veggie broth I had in the freezer, but I must’ve used a little too many greens in the last batch, as I discovered that my broth had made the soup slightly bitter. To counteract that, I added a teaspoon of honey, a few dashes of paprika, and a little chicken boullion for extra salt. Problem solved – soup turned out delicious.
Thanks for a great recipe.
Hi Nick! So glad the soup was delicious with the modifications 🙂
Absolutely LOVE this recipe. Made it last week. Making it again this week. The only modification I made was to add cayenne pepper directly to the soup and also added some caraway seed when I added the carrots onions and garlic.
Easy, healthy, filling, delicious. What more could you want.
Hi Daniel – so glad you are enjoying this soup!! Thanks for taking the time to let me know 🙂
Made it today with few little changes. Wonderful! Thank you so much! 🙂
You’re welcome Vedrana! 🙂
This soup has become one of my go to recipes. Tonight we were leaving for vacation so I threw in some extras to clean out the produce drawer – a few red peppers and a pack of mushrooms. Turned out super tasty as usual! So simple and healthy but so delicious and satisfying. Thanks!
Love the idea of adding red peppers and mushrooms Chloe! 🙂
i just turned off the burner after making a double-batch of this soup (with my own homemade chicken broth), and it is delicious. I know my kids will love it, too. They love cabbage and sausage. Thank you for sharing. Next time, though, I’m going to try throwing it all in the crockpot.
Let me know how it works out in the slow cooker Parwald! So glad you like it 🙂
Had leftover cooked onions & sausage from our recent campout and a head of red cabbage & carrots in the frig. I opened a can of Rotel instead of tomatoes, and boy, did this turn out well! Not too much kick, but some heat.
It was quite easy, very tasty, and required only a little energy which is great after camping, or on a week night. 😉 I’ll fix this meal again!
Sounds great Catina! Thanks for taking the time to comment and let me know 🙂
So Easy AND Delicious! I used a pressure cooker and cooked the whole meal in it. From browning the sausage and onions to cutting up the veggies, the soup was ready to eat in 45 minutes. My picky daughter even loved it! Thanks so much. I’m on to trying the Cheesy Stuffed Delicata Squash!
That is great Kelly – thanks for taking the time to leave me a comment and let me know! Hope your family also loved the Delicata Squash 🙂
Loved this recipie super easy first time making dinner and it was a HUGE hit!
Thanks for taking the time to comment and let me know Lindsay!
Sooo delicious!! I did not even think I like cabbage till after making this soup for a friend. I make it all the time now! My 2 year old loves it!!
Thanks so much Rachel – I love hearing that! 🙂
My family LOVES this recipe! We use purple cabbage in place of green because my mother gave me a 4 heads of it.
Thanks for taking the time to let me know Gabrielle! Love the idea of purple cabbage 🙂
Great recipe. Thank you. I took the liberty of adding a small glug of red wine to the sausage after it was browned and let it cook down for a few minutes and I also used some fire roasted dice tomatoes. Would make again for sure.
I bet that red wine added a lot of flavor MJ!
I finally made this last night. The texture created by shredding in the food processor was perfect. The soup was nice and thick. I halved the recipe because we have too many leftovers (i need to get that extra freezer!). Wonderful flavor. My sausage had a nice taste of fennel it it too. Thanks!
I wish we had too many leftovers – they just seem to go so fast in our house. Glad you liked the soup! 🙂
Another snowy day, another wonderful Everyday Maven soup recipe made! I used turkey and chicken sausage, turkey stock, and didn’t shred the cabbage, but it tastes most delicious. Thanks for posting.
That sounds wonderful Gloria. Turkey stock is my favorite – it’s so rich and flavorful!
Oh I wish it was winter right now, this looks like a real comfort heart warming soup.
I’ll trade you! I’ll give you soup if you give me summer lol 😉
Ground meat is indeed a timesaver and delicious! I love that you shredded the cabbage here. I usually just slice it, but shredding it must infuse it into the soup so you get some in every bite. This is such a delicious, satisfying soup and even better since it uses pantry and fridge staples.
It is and you could make this soup with chicken sausage or turkey sausage – I think any of them will give it a great flavor!
I did not know there is MSG in Italian sausage. Thanks for the alert. Really need to read all food labels.
With grounds completely snow covered, not to mention the cold temp, a big bowl of your yummy soup would be very comforting.
You really do Norma. It’s a sad reality but our food supply is pretty contaminated.
Alyssa, do you take photos of every meal you make in the hopes of sharing it with us? You are a good woman. Thanks again for an accessible meal.
Not even close! If there is still good light and I know the recipe is ready to share, I’ll take photos otherwise if it’s something I know I want to share, I’ll make a point to remake it when I think there will be some light. It is a challenge though because I don’t cook “for the blog”, I cook for my family and then share what I am cooking, which doesn’t always coincide with good light (especially in this season!).
Alyssa,
Your soup looks delicious. I’m a fan of ‘born of desperation’ soups, as those are frequently memorable. I nearly always have onions on hand, and though I’m emptying quart jars of crushed tomatoes weekly there’s still plenty in the pantry. Thanks!
So true Kirsten, those are often the best soups!
This soup looks delicious! I am going to make it this week for sure as I have all the ingredients. The only thing I would change is I would not shred my cabbage but cut it into 1/2″-1″ cubes for a more rustic feel. One less item to clean in the kitchen 🙂 I do believe they sell pre-shredded cabbage in bags at the grocery store for those who do not want to chop or do not have a food processor.
They do Mary! In fact, Trader Joe’s has a nice size bag of already shredded cabbage for $1.19 (at least here). Enjoy!
This looks delicious! I’ve been making a lot of soup lately, too. We’re just having the kind of weather than calls for tucking into a big bowl of something warm and homey.
Seriously! It hasn’t been as cold here as most of the US but I like to have soup almost everyday in winter no matter what!
We use ground meat all the time too. Last night it was bison!
I love Bison – especially for Chili. It is just so convenient and such a time saver to use something crumbled 🙂