Vegetable Pastina Soup, a childhood favorite, contains veggies with tiny pasta stars or alphabet shapes in a tomato broth.
Vegetable Pastina Soup
By Sue Lau | Palatable Pastime
Vegetable Pastina Soup is my recipe of the day with the blogging group Soup Swappers. We post monthly on the third Saturday with recipes for soups following select themes.
We are sharing recipes for favorite childhood soups this month. And for my choice, I decided to do a twist on the usual pastina soups.
Pastina means tiny pasta. So the type of pasta used in this soup will either be star shapes or alphabet. It doesn’t matter which.
Often the stars is the chicken based and alphabet will be vegetable, so you can see the twist with me using stars.
I’ve made this a relatively easy soup to heat up.
For covid life, I have stocked a number of “lockdown” type pantry ingredients that might need to be used, such as canned mixed vegetables. Besides saving the day if you can’t get out to buy fresh mirepoix vegetables or things like corn, potatoes and green beans, it does save on prep time.
Pantry recipes can be great even not in a lockdown, just for the easy nature or when you want food quick.
But wouldn’t you know it, my Ohio county has gone purple just today for the first time. I’ll be digging a lot in my pantry. I usually adore shopping for fresh produce often. But stuck at home. And I hate having store shoppers pick my veggies.
Sometimes seeing the produce is what inspires.
Soup Swappers
Favorite Childhood Soups
- Alphabet Soup from Karen’s Kitchen Stories
- Chicken Soup with Danish Flour Dumplings from Sid’s Sea Palm Cooking
- Clean the Refrigerator Soup AKA Garbage Soup from A Day in the Life on the Farm
- Mom’s Quick Alphabet Soup from Sneha’s Recipe
- Potato and Spinach Soup from Magical Ingredients
- Ramen Afternoons: From Powdered Broth to Simmered Trotters from Culinary Adventures with Camilla
- Rotisserie Chicken Alphabet Soup from Faith, Hope, Love, & Luck Survive Despite a Whiskered Accomplice
- Tomato Clam Chowder from Making Miracles
- Vegetable Pastina Soup from Palatable Pastime (You are Here!)
Vegetable Pastina Soup
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Vegetable Pastina Soup

Vegetable Pastina Soup
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 teaspoon minced garlic
- 1/4 cup chopped onion
- 2 teaspoons granulated sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
- 6 cups vegetable broth
- 15 ounce can mixed vegetables undrained
- 5.5 ounce can tomato juice
- 2 roma tomatoes diced
- 1 cup uncooked pastina stars or alphabet pasta
Instructions
- Saute the onion and garlic in olive oil 3-5 minutes to soften.
- Add remaining ingredients except pastina and bring to a boil.
- Once boiling, stir in the pastina and reduce heat; simmer gently for ten minutes or until pasta is cooked through.
Notes
Join my recipe group on Facebook for more recipes from blogger friends around the world!
This soup filled with vegetables is sure to keep your immune system strong. Stay safe Sue.
Love this pastina soup, looks so deliicous!
Look at you being all fancy with your “pastina” shapes! Definitely a bowl of soup almost any child…or grownup…would dive into!
Saving this recipe until I can find either alphabet pasta or stars so I can make a soup that reminds me of my childhood!
I’d never heard the term pastina, but I love it! Your soup is one big bowl of comfort and nutritiousness.
It’s the fancy term for star pasta.
The tiny star pasta! I love pantry friendly recipes like this – and it’s definitely time to start hitting the pantry and freezer stashes again and stay out of the stores as much as possible. 🙁
The soup looks inviting and comforting. We love this kind of soup in our home. Stay safe!