Cold season calls for healing soups! Nothing is better than a warm cup of soup when you’re battling seasonal sickness and this is the best soup for colds! With healing properties, this Cold Busting Soup recipe is just what the doctor ordered if you’re feeling under the weather.
When cold and flu season hits, you need a comforting soup that is filled with ingredients that will help healing in your back pocket. This is your soup.
This lovely homemade soup recipe is the kind you make when you feel a little something coming on. You know the classic cold symptoms: If your nose is feeling stuffy, there’s a little scratch in your throat, and you want to stay in your PJs all day, this is the recipe you need.
Cold Busting Soup recipe. Yes, ma’am. Or sir.
Your grandma probably told you to make homemade chicken noodle soup when you’re sick. She was right. Well, she was mostly right. The bone broth that’s used to make chicken noodle soup can help heal a cold. The noodles? No, those will just comfort your soul. 🙂 Homemade Chicken Soup without the noodles can be just as comforting!
What makes this the best soup for colds? This Cold Busting Soup is made with nourishing bone broth. Now would be a great time to use homemade bone broth. It’s also packed with foods that are known to boost your immune system and decrease the strength of a cold: garlic, kale (leafy greens), lemon, cayenne pepper, cauliflower, and sweet potatoes.
All of these foods are nutritional powerhouses that can help knock out that cold before it gains too much traction. Let’s take a closer look at the ingredients!
Recipe Ingredients–What You Need
This recipe calls for simple ingredients, but they are powerful and the key ingredients make this the best healthy recipe for soup season.
Coconut or Avocado oil
The fat from the oil used in this best soup for colds will help your body absorb the fat soluble vitamins present.
Onion
Onions contain sulfur compounds that help fight and clear mucus from your airways. It’s also been shown to ease symptoms of a sore throat.
Sweet Potato
Sweet potatoes are high in vitamins C and A, both important for keeping your immune system strong.
Cauliflower
Cauliflower is great to eat when you have a cold as it is rich in glutathione, a powerful antioxidant that helps fight off infection.
Garlic
Garlic has been used medicinally for centuries. It’s filled with compounds that help your immune system fight germs.
Chicken Stock
Bone broth contains vitamins, minerals, and amino acids that strengthen immune function. There’s also evidence that it can help increase the movement of nasal fluids in the upper respiratory tract, so important when you have a cold virus!
Parsley
High levels of vitamin C, chlorophyll, and vitamin K in parsley all help your immune system fight infections.
Thyme
Thyme has antiviral, antibiotic, antimicrobial, decongestant, expectorant properties that can help shorten the time you have your cold. I use dried herbs, but fresh herbs are a great choice, too.
Cayenne Pepper
Cayenne pepper is useful when fighting a cold because it has a compound called capsaicin, which may relieve symptoms such as sneezing, a stuffy nose, postnasal drip, and congestion.
Lemon juice
Lemon juice is thought to have the ability to reduce phlegm as well as decrease the strength of cold and flu viruses.
Sea Salt and Pepper
These bring out the flavor and make the soup taste delicious.
Kale, Spinach, or other Leafy Greens
Leafy greens have a number of benefits, and are nutrient-dense foods that can aid in healing. They are rich in folic acid, vitamin C, potassium and magnesium, and contain a variety of phytochemicals, all of which can help boost your immune system. They are also a good source of beta carotene, which can be converted into vitamin A and has been shown to improve immune function. Kale, spinach, or bok choy are all options.
Cinnamon
Cinnamon is one of the top spices to relieve coughing, colds, and a sore throat. It is rich in antioxidant polyphenols and proanthocyanidins which boost immunity. In addition, it has strong antiviral, antibacterial, and antifungal properties. A little bit goes a long way!
How to Make the Best Soup for Colds
- In a large stockpot, heat about a tablespoon of oil over medium heat.
- Add your onion and and cook until the onion is soft and translucent, about 8 minutes.
- Add the sweet potato and stir so it is coated with some of the oil. Allow to cook about 5 minutes. Add the cauliflower, garlic, stock, parsley, thyme, cayenne, salt and pepper, and bring to a boil.
- Lower heat and simmer about 20-25 minutes.
- Add the kale and lemon juice and cook until the kale, spinach, or other greens are wilted, about 5 more minutes.
- Stir in the dash of cinnamon and serve.
Even if you’re not feeling sick, this is the soup you want to eat to keep yourself healthy. Foods that nourish our bodies just make us feel good. Make this best soup for colds even if you’re feeling well!
Eating foods with anti-inflammatory properties can help you whether you’re sick or not. Check out this article on the anti-inflammatory diet for more information. I also recommend adding elderberry syrup to your routine to keep your immune system strong!
If you have a cough, try my easy Homemade Cough Syrup!
If you make this Cold Busting Soup recipe or any of my other healthy recipes, please share it on Instagram and I’ll feature you! Also, if you try it, please leave a comment with a star rating below! Those star ratings are so helpful in helping my recipes get discovered. I appreciate you!
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Cold-Busting Soup
- Total Time: 50 mins
- Yield: 8 1x
- Diet: Gluten Free
Description
This Cold Busting Soup is exactly what you need if you feel sickness coming on. It’s packed with nourishing, immune-boosting foods!
Ingredients
- coconut or avocado oil
- 1 large onion, chopped
- 1 sweet potato, cut into small cubes (I don’t peel mine, but feel free to do so if you wish)
- 2 cups cauliflower florets, cut into small pieces
- 3 garlic cloves, minced
- 8 cups chicken stock, homemade if possible
- 1 teaspoon dried parsley
- 1 teaspoon dried thyme
- 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
- 1/4 teaspoon ground pepper
- 4 stems of kale, deveined and torn into small pieces (or other leafy green)
- dash cinnamon
Instructions
- In a large soup pot, heat about a tablespoon of oil over medium heat.
- Add your onion and and cook until the onion is soft and translucent, about 8 minutes.
- Add the sweet potato and stir so it is coated with some of the oil. Allow to cook about 5 minutes. Add the cauliflower, garlic, stock, parsley, thyme, cayenne, salt and pepper, and bring to a boil.
- Lower heat and simmer about 20-25 minutes.
- Add the kale and lemon juice and cook until the kale is wilted, about 5 more minutes.
- Stir in the dash of cinnamon and serve.
- Prep Time: 10 mins
- Cook Time: 40 mins
- Category: soup
- Method: stove top
- Cuisine: American
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1/8 of recipe
- Calories: 134
- Sugar: 5.9g
- Sodium: 482.8mg
- Fat: 4.8g
- Saturated Fat: 2.3g
- Carbohydrates: 15.6g
- Fiber: 1.8g
- Protein: 7.6g
- Cholesterol: 7.2mg
Another really delicious soup you’ll love is this Greek Lemon Chicken Soup. It’s ready in 20 minutes and has some great healing properties as well!
Note that this recipe was first published in October 2016. Updates were made and a video added March 2022.
I am a soup fan. Thankyou so much
Healthy food plays an important role in our life. Thankyou for this kind of healthy recipes
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New go to when sick! Made it with purple sweet potatoes so I had purple soup 😆 delicious!
So glad to hear this was good for you when you were sick! Thank you for the feedback and star rating.
Delicioso. Awesome Soup. Thank you for posting this recipe! Healthy and tasty!
Let’s admit together your Soup looks very tempting, I haven’t tried it to appreciate it more specifically but just looking at the pictures and the recipe to make it can tell it’s delicious.
Nice recipe, I’ve just done this dish by following your demonstration and it’s quite good, thanks
dinner I usually have a light meal with green vegetables and a little meat. then i will play the game
I have COVID and made your cold busting soup- exactly as posted. I love it and will make it part of my regular soup rotation- so healthy and flavorful. I have been really sick and could definitely feel how nourishing this soup was for my body. Thank you!
Made this for my hubby who suddenly began sneezing alot! Man, we loved this, I even added turmeric, ginger paste, onions and celery and carrots. So glad I doubled the recipe as 4 days later I started sneezing alot! We both were fine/healthy within a week— but loved the soup so much that I just made another batch, this time to share part of it with our neighbors and with my sister and her hubby as they arrive back home after “snowbirding” down south for 3+ months— & its rainy/snowy and cold! Great taste & healthy recipe— hubby said its the best soup he ever had!
I made this while grappling with Covid (Omicron). I could tell I wasn’t myself because I made almost no changes! I dug down into the freezer to find some stashed chicken broth, we had left over roast cauliflower, so I used that and Spinach instead of Kale. It was delicious and definitely a keeper of a recipe. Many thanks.
great soup ingredients and nice that it includes one of my favorites, sweet potatoes, with or without a cold I’ll take it, thank you!
Thank you!
This soup is amazing! Making it for the second time, and I’m experimenting with adding some other spices – tumeric and ginger. My boyfriend also loved and it and I clearly should have doubled the recipe. Thank you!!
So happy to hear this! Thank you for the feedback!
Great soup for our sick fam!