How You Can Take A Gallon Of Olive Garden's Beloved Soup Home

While some restaurants can lose their charm after decades of service, the Olive Garden experience continues to delight us. The unlimited soup, salad, and breadsticks are a major draw for many, and sure, you could stay home and make soup, but you'll never replicate the perfection that is Olive Garden's minestrone. And if you're in the mood to share that soup with, say, 12 of your closest friends, you can buy a gallon of it to share with them for your next movie night, dinner party, or just because you want to. Of course, you can also choose to hoard it all for yourself, like a dragon.

Olive Garden's catering menu is designed for any occasion, ranging from business meetings and family reunions to bridal parties. All of the four soup options from the catering menu — chicken & gnocchi, pasta e fagioli, minestrone, and zuppa toscana, which are made fresh in-house every day — can be ordered in the larger, 12-serving container. The cost will vary based on location, but is generally around $30.

Best of all, food that's left over from Olive Garden, and in particular, soup, will keep in the fridge for around three to four days as long as it's stored in an air-tight container. So while you enjoy this wealth of soup at home, it's best to do so in an appropriate amount of time. And while you're at it, consider adding just a few more items from the menu to make a full meal out of what's usually just the appetizer.

Olive Garden's catering menu also offers a Jumbo House Salad option that serves up to 12 people, but there's no need to choose between soup and salad when you can have both. It also offers 12 of the absolute best Olive Garden appetizer — breadsticks — which has been on the menu since the restaurant opened in 1982, and which are served with the salad.

Olive Garden's catering menu also expands beyond appetizers and offers various ways to enjoy regular menu items as well. While it's a great option for parties, it's also a valuable resource for occasions that may be made easier with some meal prepping. For example, if a new baby is in the home, or a recent surgery or injury makes cooking feel challenging, having delicious soup or pasta waiting in the fridge can be a lifesaver. 

One more thing to remember about that gallon soup: If you're serving up any of it on the day of purchase for an event, make sure to keep it hot in a slow cooker that's set to warm. But if you're reheating it after a day or two, use the microwave or stovetop. The slow cooker takes too long to heat up (it says so right there in the name) to heat food past the temperature danger zone, which according to the United States Department of Agriculture, is between 40 and 140 degrees Fahrenheit. It'll get there eventually, but at a far slower rate than safety standards require.