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13 Turkey Soup Recipes That Will Make Good Use of Your Leftovers

Updated on October 08, 2025

If you spent Thanksgiving day cooking and cleaning, you deserve to kick your feet up and tuck into a cozy bowl of soup the next day.

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Our Best Ideas for Turkey Soup

Besides making great use of your extra turkey, a comforting soup is a great way to use up leftover veggies or purge whatever is left in your crisper drawer after a big holiday meal. Plus, it pairs nicely with whatever leftover stuffing or mashed potatoes you've got kicking around—which means you should be relieved of your usual cooking duties for at least a day or two post-Thanksgiving.

Ready to kick your feet up and dig into a big bowl of comfort? This recipe is a great place to start. It's loaded with veggies for a complete meal in a single bowl. What could be better than that?

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Turkey Soup with Egg Noodles and Vegetables

This satisfyng soup is a breeze to make. It's ready fast and only calls for a handful of ingredients—including that leftover turkey you need to use up.

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Turkey Tortilla Soup

Hold on to your roasted turkey leftovers (including the bones to make stock) and make this spicy Mexican-inspired soup the next day.

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Turkey and Wild Rice Soup

This hearty turkey and wild rice soup is packed with veggies and herbs, making it a cozy and satisfying way to use up leftover turkey.

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Turkey Dumpling Stew

The perfect day-after dinner: a thick, comforting, vegetable-filled turkey stew made with homemade stock and topped with buttery dumplings.
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Leftover Roast Turkey Pho

Reinvent your Thanksgiving turkey into a bowl of intensely flavorful Vietnamese-style pho. In our take, we fortify store-bought chicken broth with turkey bones, charred vegetables and toasted spices to create a rich broth.
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Pap's Turkey and Dumpling Soup

This soup takes a bit of time and effort, but we promise the end result is worth it. Plus, it's a great way to make use of your leftover turkey meat and carcass—just sub it in for the turkey necks backs and wings the recipe calls for.

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Bird to the Last Drop

Even if you're still tired from preparing Thanksgiving dinner, you can make Alton Brown's simple turkey soup by utilizing the pantry, freezer and spice cabinet.
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Short Cut Salsa Verde Turkey Soup

This recipe calls for ground turkey which makes it easy to whip up any night of the week—but you could just as easily use the leftover turkey from your Thanksgiving meal.

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Turkey Vegetable Soup with Stuffing Dumplings

Two Thanksgiving favorites, turkey and stuffing, are combined into one dish. If your leftover stuffing is chunky and rustic, finely chop it to make these delicate dumplings.
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Next-Day Turkey Soup

This soup is made with a stock so good you'll be licking your soup bowls clean. Michael Chiarello adds leftovers like Brussels sprouts, sweet potatoes and green beans to his version.
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Turkey-Escarole Soup with Farfalline

In this spin on a classic Italian soup, leftover roast turkey is paired with hearty greens and potatoes that have been cooked until tender in a rich, lemon-scented broth. 
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Turkey Broth

Send all the leftovers home with your guests? Put the bird's carcass to work by making broth, which you can freeze and use later in any number of soup recipes.
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