You'll love this healthy chicken taco soup recipe that's quick, high protein, and macro friendly! Made with just a handful of easy to find pantry staples, we also show you how to make this a low carb recipe.
This is such an easy healthy Mexican soup!
With 39 grams of protein, 12 net carbs, 6 grams of fat, and less than 300 calories per serving, our quick stovetop soup is an easy low calorie, Weight Watchers friendly, and a diabetic friendly soup for heart health or for losing a little extra weight.
When you're craving Mexican (inspired) meals but want something light and healthy, our high protein taco soup recipe hits the spot any month of the year!
Use it for your meal prep lunches for the week, as a light dinner, or freeze it for later in our favorite soup cubes.
What you'll need
- canola oil - or another type of neutral cooking oil
- medium onion - a yellow onion, white, sweet, or red all work great
- green bell pepper - feel free to use a different color like red, orange, or yellow if you have it
- garlic cloves - freshly minced, jar garlic, or Dourot frozen garlic cubes
- chicken broth - or chicken bone broth to increase the protein
- boneless skinless chicken breast - feel free to swap chicken tenderloins, boneless chicken thighs, or even turkey breast. Shred the meat or cube it, or you can even use ground chicken. You can use rotisserie chicken too!
- canned Rotel diced tomatoes with green chilis - you can also swap diced tomatoes and add a 4 oz can of mild green chilis
- canned corn kernels- or defrosted frozen corn
- canned black beans- pinto beans are another great choice. **see note below on how to leave these out
- taco seasoning - we love to use sugar free varieties or we make our sugar free taco seasoning.
- fine sea salt
- ground pepper
- chopped cilantro
Make it without beans (even lower carb)
If you're trying to reduce your carbs or just can't eat beans, you can leave out the beans and replace them with 2 cups of diced mushrooms, chopped zucchini, or a mix of both! Mushrooms make a fantastic bean substitute, which is how we lighten up our beanless chili recipe too.
How to make healthy taco soup
- Heat a large soup pot over medium-high heat. Add the oil. Once the oil is heated, add the diced onion, bell pepper, and minced garlic. Saute until the veggies are soft.
- Add in the chicken broth, the whole boneless skinless chicken breasts, the canned, Rotel tomatoes, the corn, the black beans, taco seasoning, salt, pepper, and chopped cilantro.
- Bring the soup to a simmer and cook it for 25-30 minutes.
- Carefully the chicken breasts and shred them with two forks on a cutting board. Add the shredded chicken back to the pot.
- Serve the taco soup with garnishes like more cilantro, crushed tortilla chips (to make this a chicken tortilla taco soup), diced avocado, lime wedges, sour cream, shredded cheddar cheese, or cotija cheese. Enjoy!
Jenni's tips
- The nutritional info below is just for the taco soup recipe, it doesn't include the optional toppings. The entire soup weighs 3060 g. Each serving is 382 g if you use a tracking calculator like My Fitness Pal.
- Add more broth or water as needed if the soup gets thicker after cooling.
- If you use rotisserie chicken instead of cooking your own, you might need to cut out the salt in the soup or even use a low sodium chicken broth.
- Make it creamy: Mix in an 8 oz cubed block of very soft cream cheese after you add the shredded chicken back to the soup pot. You'll need to do a fair amount of stirring to get it to fully melt it. You can microwave the cream cheese cubes for 20-30 seconds to make it soft.
- Leftover soup will last for 5 days in the fridge or you can freeze it for 3 months.
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Recipe
Easy Chicken Taco Soup
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon canola oil
- 1 medium onion diced 160g
- 1 large green bell pepper diced 164g
- 3 garlic cloves minced 20g
- 32 oz chicken broth 946mL
- 2 lbs boneless skinless chicken breast 908g
- 2 10oz cans Rotel diced tomatoes with green chilis 566g
- 1 15oz can corn kernels, drained 425g
- 1 15oz can black beans, drained and rinsed 439g
- 2-3 T taco seasoning 9g
- ½ teaspoon fine sea salt
- ¼ teaspoon ground pepper
- ¼ cup chopped cilantro 2g
Instructions
- Preheat a large pot with the oil over medium-high heat. Add the chopped onion, green bell pepper, and minced garlic. Saute until the vegetables soften.
- Add the chicken broth, whole chicken breasts, Rotel tomatoes, drained corn, drained black beans, taco seasoning, salt, pepper, and chopped cilantro to the pot.
- Bring to a simmer and cook for 25-30 minutes.
- Remove the chicken breasts and shred them with two forks. Add the chicken back to the soup pot.
- Serve the soup with garnishes like cilantro, crushed tortilla chips, avocado, lime wedges, sour cream, cheddar cheese, or cotija cheese. Enjoy!
Notes
- The nutritional info is just for the soup, not the toppings. The entire soup weighs 3060 g. Each serving is 382 g.
- Add more broth or water to the soup if it gets too thick.
- Creamy version: you can add in an 8 oz block of very soft cream cheese cut into cubes after you add the shredded chicken back to the pot. It will take quite a bit of stirring to get this to melt in. I usually cut the cream cheese into cubes and microwave it for 20-30 seconds. This isn't factored into the nutritional info.
- Lower carb version: Leave out the beans. You can add extra low carb veggies like chopped mushrooms, zucchini, or even spinach if you'd like.
- Substitutions: Replace the Rotel with 1 (15 oz) can diced tomatoes and 1 (4 oz) can of mild green chilis.
- Leftovers will keep up to 5 days in the fridge or 3 months in the freezer.
Nutrition
Serving: 1gCalories: 280kcalCarbohydrates: 15gProtein: 39gFat: 6gSaturated Fat: 1gPolyunsaturated Fat: 4gCholesterol: 99mgSodium: 1130mgFiber: 3gSugar: 3g
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