This Cilantro Spinach Soup Recipe is such a good step by step to building a delicious healthy soup any day of the week.
Post holidays, this Cilantro Spinach Soup is the soup you are looking for. It’s light, delicious, and full of vegetables and protein. The best part is that it is not full of cream or milk but made with water. The water as the base works well and keeps this soup well in the “healthy things I’m making in January” range.
The soup takes about 40-45 minutes to make start to finish. The longest part is allowing the chicken to simmer and cook. After the chicken has cooked, the rest of the soup happens pretty quickly. We are recommending skinless boneless dark meat for this recipe, because it doesn’t get as dry as white meat, and bones would make this more complicated than it needs to be. However boneless white meat can work.
If you happen to be one of those people that is genetically wired to think Cilantro tastes like soap- then this recipe may not be for you. However you may be able to just use Spinach, so just throw an extra bag in there and call yourself Popeye.
Let’s talk garnish. Now with all the greens and the water for base, we feel that for the garnish you have earned yourself a nice healthy dollop of sour cream that helps bring all the flavor together. If you are really taking January seriously, you can sub the sour cream with a little bit of plain Greek yogurt. The yogurt almost tastes exactly the same, and it brings a little extra protein.
Our Favorite Tools for Our Cilantro Spinach Soup
If you do not have an immersion blender, a good blender, like the Vitamix or Ninja could work just fine. Just be careful that you do not go over the Max fill line. You don’t want to find out what happens if you go over the Max- Fill line. Also, the soup will be very hot. Adding very hot soup to a blender can cause an explosion (for real). So make sure you open the feeder hole in the top and cover it with a dish towel so it doesn’t go everywhere. This will allow some of the steam to escape.
We think we may have covered any questions, but if you have any others please let us know in the comments! Happy Souping!
Try some of our other favorite Soup Recipes
Cilantro Spinach Soup
Course: SoupsCuisine: Cuban AmericanDifficulty: Easy8
servings5
minutes40
minutesIngredients
4 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
8 cups of water
6 bunches of cilantro, discard lower portion of stems (it’s about 4 ½ cups of cilantro)
4 garlic cloves, peeled and left whole
10 oz fresh baby spinach
Salt and freshly cracked pepper
2 cups of ice
Juice of 1 lime
1 tablespoon of hot sauce
To garnish: more cilantro leaves, avocado wedges, sour cream
Directions
- In a large pot, place the chicken thighs, water, garlic cloves, a teaspoon of salt and freshly cracked pepper. With the heat on high bring to a boil then cover and lower the heat to medium/low. Simmer for 25-35 minutes.
- When the chicken is completely cooked and tender, add the spinach and all the cilantro. Allow the spinach and cilantro to cook in the broth for 5 minutes then turn off the heat.
- With an immersion blender gently blend the soup.
- Add the ice. *** We know this seems silly, but adding the ice at this point shocks the spinach and cilantro to hold on to their beautiful green color and maintain their nutrients.
- Add the hot sauce and lime juice to finish. Taste for salt and pepper and adjust seasoning as needed.
- Serve the soup hot with cold garnishes for the best combination. I love serving it with sour cream, crushed tortilla chips, avocado or even guacamole and some cilantro leaves. If you love more heat, add a few dashes of hot sauce.
