Ham and Cabbage Soup

This ham and cabbage soup recipe is a family favorite. It’s the perfect dish to make after a big ham dinner. Use the ham bone to make a flavorful ham stock and lots of healthy vegetables to make this warming soup. There is also a low calorie and low carb version.

You might also love this creamy vegetable and ham casserole recipe.

My husband was the one who introduced me to ham and cabbage soup. It was something his mom would make from leftover ham bone and scraps. It was a dish that his family loved. And while my family never had ham very often I have found this is a very warming and hearty dish and a great use of leftover ham.

This tasty soup is one of my husband’s favorite comfort foods in the winter and it’s become one of mine too. The best thing about this ham and cabbage soup recipe is that it’s simple and very tasty. And because ham is a lean protein it adds lots of flavor without too many calories.

Recipe ingredients and substitutions.

Every time we have a ham, we use the bone to make ham stock and I’ll show you how simple it is to do below. The simple ingredients I use for this recipe is ham stock, ham, chopped carrots, cabbage, onion, celery and white potatoes. If you want to make it keto friendly just eliminate the potatoes.

The only seasoning I use is salt and black pepper. The salt can be tricky as ham tends to be salty so I wait til the end to add it after I’ve tasted the soup.

Note if you are not making your own ham stock you can substitute with chicken stock or broth, beef broth, vegetable broth or even just water. You will have to adjust seasonings accordingly though.

As for substitutions if you want a lower carb dish you can eliminate the potatoes. Some people put in green beans and I guess you can add whatever veggies you want though I think carrots, celery and onions are used in most soup recipes. But the ham and cabbage are the star ingredients and should not be substituted.

How to make ham stock with a ham bone.

If you have a ham for the holidays and this is the perfect recipe to use the leftover scraps and to make the stock. I like the use the slow cooker or crock pot because it’s kind of set and forget way to do it. But you can also do it on the stove.

Step 1: Add the large hambone (after you’ve cleaned as much meat as you want off of it) and pour water to cover almost to the top of the slow cooker. Add a  bay leaf or two, some pepper and I omit the salt because you never know how much is in a ham.

You can even just add water with no seasonings and you will get a flavorful broth from the ham. Let that cook over night and you should get a nice rich broth.

Step 2: Strain the broth from the crockpot into a big soup pot and put in the refrigerator for a few hours. When you do this, the fat will rise to the top and harden, making it easy to take off. See how it hardens (pic below).

Step 3: Use the stock to make soup right away or pour into freezer containers and use at another time.

If you want to make ham stock on the stove just add the ham bone to a very deep pot and cover with water and extra seasonings if you want. Cook for an hour or so and you will get a flavorful broth. Strain and use right away or freeze.

How to make ham and cabbage soup.

1. Get out a large stock pot or dutch oven and heat to medium high heat. Add the stock and let it heat up.
2. In the meantime chop up your veggies and add them to your pot. I like to use onions, carrots, celery, potatoes and of course green cabbage. My hubby likes the chopped cabbage to be a little on the bigger side but you can do what you want. I would not shred it though. You want bite size pieces.
3. Turn the heat down to medium heat and bring to a simmer. Cook all of the ingredients until the vegetables soften which may be up to an hour or so. Make sure you have enough stock to cover all the veggies and if not, add water.
4. Once the veggies have softened, add the bite size pieces of cooked ham and cook for about 5 minutes more.
5. At that point you can season with salt and black pepper to taste. Because ham can be salty I suggest you taste the broth before adding and salt. The black pepper is always good to add in my opinion. 

And that is all there is to it. Ladle into bowls and serve with crusty bread! Store leftover soup in an airtight container or freeze for another time. (Please scroll down for the printable recipe card.)

If you want to make this a ham soup keto friendly.

As I mentioned above if you want to make this low carb you can just eliminated the potatoes as all the other ingredients are pretty low carb.

Without the potatoes each serving has roughly 123 calories and 6.1g net carbs. So it can be a low carb and low calorie soup!

If you really miss potatoes, try using turnips, radishes, celery root or rutabagas as a potato substitute.

Recipe notes and tips.

• This is the way that we make ham and cabbage soup in our family. It’s simple but tasty. Some people add green beans, some make it creamy, some add garlic, etc. Feel free to tweak this recipe to suit your tastes.
• If you don’t have a ham bone to make stock, you can try chicken or vegetable broth or stock instead. You will definitely want to season with more salt and black pepper though.
• If you do make the ham stock you can freeze containers of it for other soup recipes. It should be very flavorful for homemade broth.
• If you have extra raw cabbage you might like this other recipe low calorie cabbage soup. It’s really flavorful and great for post holiday meals.
• I have lots of other cabbage recipes as it’s a great low carb vegetable. I especially love to make cabbage noodles for a low carb pasta substitute.
• Or try these leftover ham recipes if you have a lot of leftover meat.

And that is all there is to it for this easy ham and cabbage soup. Even though it’s a simple soup, it’s a hearty meal in of itself. We just eat it with French or Italian bread and that’s our whole meal. If you are a soup lover, I have over 50 soup recipes to try.

This is the best recipe to use leftover holiday ham. I hope you like it and if you’ve ever heard of it before, drop me a line in the comments and tell me how you make yours. Do you add green beans?

You might also like this Hungarian ham casserole if you have leftover ham.