Minestrone Soup - Tried and Tasted

Packed full of veg and noodles, Minestrone Soup should be the perfect meal for a cold winter’s day – but can it still deliver when it’s low calorie?

Our fearless tasters embarked on a journey of discovery through six Minestrone Soups, all under 180 calories, to find the best one just for you. Have a look and see which soup came in first.

Our tasters rated all the soups out of 5 and they have been ranked in order according to their average score.

Table 1: Low Calorie Minestrone Soups Compared

Product	Baxters Healthy Minestrone Soup with Wholemeal Pasta	Heinz Classic Minestrone Soup	Sainsbury’s Minestrone Soup
Ranking	1	2	3
Appearance	Full of veg and pasta, this soup looked tempting.	It was decided that this was the best in terms of appearance – a tempting beginning.	A bit oily-looking but plenty of noodles.
Smell	The tasters were happy to smell this minestrone soup – lovely vegetable aromas.	The tasters thought this soup smelled delicious and beefy.	Another test for the tasters’ noses – they managed to come up with the words ‘musty,’ ‘earthy’ and ‘herby.’ We weren’t entirely sure whether this was a good thing or a bad thing!
Taste	The Taste Team thought this soup was delicious with a bit of added spice. Our favourite to eat and our recommendation!	Heinz slightly let down on the taste, hence it was pipped to the post. The tasters thought it was a bit acidic.	‘Plastic, but pleasantly peaish’ said one alliterative taster! The other more sensible members of the team suggested it was a fairly average flavour only marked out by a slight hint of onion.
Filling / Satisfying?	The veg and wholemeal pasta filled us up nicely.	No one thought this soup would be filling – either the tasters are getting greedy or Heinz needs to make something a bit more substantial!	This soup would fill you up if eaten with some bread.
Texture / Consistency	Chunky and thick	The thinnest of the lot, Heinz’s Minestrone Soup could do with something extra to keep us full.	Thin, but the added volume of the pasta seemed to improve it.
Our Conclusion	The winner was Baxters who impressed with their hearty minestrone soup. Although near the top of the field in terms of calories and price, our Taste Team still think it’s a good buy.	Heinz managed a very close second just behind Baxters. Whilst the soup got off to a strong start, the taste let it down and let’s face it, that’s the most important part!	Our third place minestrone soup was Sainsbury’s. The tasters didn’t hate it, but they certainly didn’t love it. They suggest you look elsewhere.
Price	£0.88	£0.82	£0.52
Calorie Content per can	142	128	132

Table 2: More Low Calorie Minestrone Soups Compared

Product	Tesco Minestrone Soup	Weight Watchers from Heinz Tuscan Minestrone Soup	Asda Minestrone Soup
Ranking	4	5	6
Appearance	The worst in terms of appearance, Tesco’s minestrone soup was described as ‘greasy’ and ‘chemically.’ Not a good start!	The team were not impressed by the lack of pasta in this soup leading them to comment that it was ‘shiny but empty.’	Thick and congealed with an unappetising skin on top – keep away!
Smell	Smell-wise our tasters thought the soup was ‘okay’ – not anything to get excited about but not repulsive either!	None of the tasters were put off by the smell but none loved it.	The tasters decided that it was safe to get near enough to sniff the soup but soon realised they’d made a mistake! One of our Taste Team described it as ‘paint stripper’ and we all decided this was accurate!
Taste	The Taste Team couldn’t find the words to describe the taste of this soup because there was no taste to speak of!	The least impressed taster said that this soup was almost enough to make him never eat soup again! But others were slightly more generous suggesting it tasted a bit cheap and too spicy.	After the tasters had taken time to recover from the smell, they thought it time to brave a taste (so you don’t have to!) It was described as ‘vinegar soup’ and ‘stodgy, spicy water’ – not a pleasant experience!
Filling / Satisfying?	The tasters weren’t keen to go back for another spoonful, but after some persuasion they did and decided that if you could finish a whole tin then you would be full.	Still fathomed by the lack of pasta, the tasters could only tell us that this would compromise its capacity for filling you up.	Our Taste Team would recommend that you didn’t finish a whole tin – if you did you would probably be full but you wouldn’t repeat the same mistake again!
Texture / Consistency	One taster described it as ‘claggy and tongue coating’ – need we say more?	The tasters were very surprised when, after a spoonful, the vegetables simply disintegrated in their mouths! Excellent if you haven’t got time to chew but otherwise very unpleasant.	‘Sloppy and mushy’ said one taster. Another still couldn’t talk as his throat stung from the vinegar flavour – we assume he would have been fairly negative!’
Our Conclusion	Despite the poor review, Tesco still managed fourth place in what was a fairly weak round. No special mentions for low calories or bargain prices – an all round average effort.	Weight Watchers got it all wrong with their Minestrone, and only managed a fifth place. The soup contained the fewest calories, but with a poor flavour and consistency it left our Taste Team putting their spoons down and swiftly leaving!	Asda really disappointed the tasters. It wasn’t just that the minestrone soup was unpleasant but it left the team feeling decidedly ill! We wouldn’t wish it on you!
Price	£0.52	£0.66	£0.52
Calorie Content per can	150	122*	126

Our minestrone ‘Soup of the Day’ was Baxters Healthy Minestrone Soup with Wholemeal Pasta – it shone out in a field where the other competitors left a lot to be desired! If you fancy trying a minestrone soup, this is the one to go for. Or if you’re feeling adventurous why not check out our recipe database and have a go yourself!

The Tried and Tasted Team have also sampled some other soups you might like:

• Vegetable Soup
• Tomato Soup
• Chicken Soup
• Carrot Soup

*Weight Watchers cans of soup are 295g compared to all other brands which are 400g or 415g.