Slow Cooker Creamy Tortellini Soup for Busy Mums
We all have a very busy life, tons of things to do everyday and children asking, “what do we eat today?” The slow cooker is a great help since it does the cooking while we are away. All we need is to get good at planning and if possible prepare more than one portion at the time, get them ready in the freezer so that you can drop everything in the crock pot.
If you happen to be good at planning meals, you’re going to love this tortellini soup because the base of it uses already made spaghetti sauce. You can make a big batch of sauce and turn part of it into something completely different. If you’ll recall, about 10 days ago I posted a recipe for a killer homemade slow cooker spaghetti sauce that is just perfect for this soup. If planning happens to not be your thing, a jar of store-bought sauce combined with some browned ground beef and Italian sausage will work well too.
You’ll start by tossing your spaghetti sauce, a brick of cream cheese, sliced mushrooms, some fresh spinach and a few cups of chicken broth in to the slow cooker.
Give it a good stir and set to cook for a few hours on high, or about 5-6 on low.
About 20 minutes before you’re ready to eat, turn your slow-cooker on high if it isn’t already and give it another stir to distribute the ingredients evenly. Pour in a bag of frozen cheese tortellini, cover and let cook for about 15 minutes or until the pasta is cooked through and hot.
TIP:
If you have problems with using low-fat and fat-free cream cheeses as they curdle and don’t blend well into the soup I would recommend using regular cream cheese. Also the spinach can be added at the end with the tortellini if you would like it to not break down as much.
