Crockpot Italian wedding soup with homemade meatballs your whole family will love. With carrots, celery and escarole in your pot, it cooks all day by itself! like our Instant Pot Italian wedding soup but low and slow.

You know we're all about easy recipes, especially those that cook all by themselves and are inexpensive to make! If you're up for an good dinner idea you've got to try this. It costs less than $10 & is definitely one of our favorite crockpot recipes! (affiliate links present)

Slow Cooker Italian Wedding Soup Recipe

If you don't have a lot of time we share how to cook frozen meatballs in it too. Either way you make it is good!! With a few ingredients, little bitty noodles and packed with as many vegetables as you want. Great when you aren't feeling good but can be enjoyed year round.

This is a healthy option for dinnertime, pair it with some easy dinner rolls and you're ready to serve it up. We made this first when it was snowy outside it was such a feel good comfort food that our kids asked for it again.

Let's talk a little bit about slow cooking shall we?? First off we have a few different varieties and we love them all. Each one has an occasion to be used like….

This is our favorite 6 quart programmable one with a locking lid so it's great for bringing to a potluck too.
We prefer not to use liners, but rather spray olive oil inside before adding our food for easier cleanups.

Let us give you a peek of our pretty thang we bought recently. It goes with our kitchen so we can leave it out on the countertop all the time.

A floral design slow cooker with a white base and lid sits on a kitchen countertop, solid for whipping up a 5 ingredient crockpot chili recipe.

Especially when the weather cools down we love slow cooker soup recipes to eat dinner. We also call it a real win because everyone in our family gobbles it up AND it only costs about $10 for the entire recipe! That is right, especially when we can find these pastina noodles on sale we load up!

Fresh produce used here like carrots and celery are usually the cheapest of them all and available year round too. They get nice and tender, so much that even a toddler could enjoy a few when it is meal time.

From the grocery store you will need some chicken stock, this fun star-shaped Pastina, onion and carrots from the produce aisle, and if you want to add some greenery pick up a small bunch of escarole. Italian Sausage is good if you want to make from scratch.

Like we said, we used raw sausage links for this one. We sliced the skin off and used the meat inside. You could alternatively buy a roll of Jimmy dean regular or spicy sausage instead. With the other added ingredients they come out great.

Ingredients

Chicken broth is the base for the liquid in there, stock works too
Carrots peeled and cut into dials, the thinner the softer they will become
Escarole is the greenery
Pastina shaped pasta or orzo pasta needs a short cooking time right in the broth, no need to cook the pasta separately.
Onion sliced or diced in there
Frozen meatballsno need to defrost, a family favorite for ease

With Homemade Meatballs

Sausage
Egg
Bread crumbs
Parmesan cheese
Salt and pepper

with Frozen Meatballs

We are famous for cooking Instant Pot frozen meatballs and putting them in all the things. Smothered in sauce as an appetizer, they are great to add into this dish too. We have directions for homemade meatballs below but if you're in a hurry those work great too. NO defrosting necessary, they will get tender by throwing them in as is.

What is a good substitute for escarole?

We mean you can leave the whole thing out if you wanted to. Other options would be to slice kale, that would be the closest. Fresh spinach leaves is better than frozen spinach for the texture of the dish but comprable.

Vegetarian option

You could leave the meat out entirely and use vegetable broth for this version. First we're going to prep everything that will then go into our slow cooker. Cut your carrots, dice your onion, and take the casing off of all 6 of your Johnsonville sausages.

We then make meatballs like we would make our meatloaf. Except we shape them into small spoon-sized bites. Cook them either on a baking sheet or on the stovetop.

It's a great flavor “swap” from using ground beef because it adds an good flavor that permeates throughout this easy Italian wedding soup recipe. Once all that is done you're going to add it all (excluding your Barilla pasta and escarole) into your slow cooker with your chicken broth.

Pouring broth from a carton into a slow cooker, with carrots and parsley in the background, sets the stage for an easy Italian wedding soup recipe.

When do you add noodles to soup?

These small noodle bits don't take long so about 20 minutes before you're ready to serve, add your choice of noodles, Pastina or acini de pepe is great. If you choose to add escarole add it now too. You want to add it right before it's being served to maintain the great al dente taste Barilla offers…it makes this totally good.

You can even ask our kids, it's their favorite! After all, it's Italy's #1 choice of pasta so it's solid for this Italian soup.

How to Make Italian Wedding Soup in Crock pot

Take the casing off your sausagesor use half and half beef and pork ground sausage instead.
- If you are using frozen mini meatballs you would skip the homemade steps here and below.
In a large bowl combine ingredients for meatballsyour egg, bread crumbs, parmesan, onion powder and any other seasonings you'd like.
Add the meatballs and bake on a baking sheet at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes.
1. You can also cook them on the stovetop over medium high heat with a bit of olive oil.
Once cooked add meatballs to slow cooker.
Add other ingredients other than escarole and small pasta
Cook on low for 6-8 hours.
15 minutes before serving add the pasta and submerge greens into liquid so they soften.
Serve this with our refrigerated biscuit pull apart bread and enjoy.

Other simple soup recipes you'll love

Chicken soup in Crockpot is solid even when you're not sick
Crockpot French onion soup gets 10 thumbs up here
Our Instant Pot lasagna soup is always a hit

Ladle of easy Italian wedding soup with meatballs, carrots, and greens; ingredients include carrots, onion, broth, and pasta.

Crockpot Italian Wedding Soup

By Easy Crockpot Italian wedding soup recipe your whole family will love and costs about $10 to make. Throw it all into your crockpot and it cooks all day! Prep: 15 minutes minsCook: 6 hours hrsTotal: 6 hours hrs 15 minutes minsServings: 8 Save Recipe Saved! Pin Recipe Comment Print Recipe

Equipment

Ingredients

64 oz chicken broth
1/2 onion, diced
2-3 carrots, sliced
1 cup pasta Barilla has this style, Pastina
1 bunch escarole
1 bag frozen meatballsif using these, skip below ingredients

With Homemade Meatballs

1 pkg Italian Sausage, Johnsonville Mild
1 egg
1 tsp minced garlic
2 tbsp grated parmesan
1/2 c bread crumbs

Instructions

First add chicken broth to your slow cooker.
Chop your carrots into similarly sized pieces and dice onion, add to crockpot.
Remove casing from sausages. Add sausage meat, egg, garlic, parmesan (optional), and bread crumbs into a bowl and mix well.
Create small meatballs that are about teaspoon sized and cook the outsides until browned. Can do this in a pan, on a cookie sheet or put 1 meatball into each hole of your mini muffin pan (we do it this way) in the oven for about 15 minutes at 350 degrees. Add to slow cooker
If using frozen meatballs add those right out of the bag. Cook for approx 6-8 hrs. on low.
About 15-20 min. before serving add pasta and chop about 10 pieces of escarole (we use dark ends) into strips and add that too. Serve!