Delicious Sopa seca de fideo, nests of angel hair pasta, first browned then cooked in broth with tomatoes and onions. The noodles absorb all the broth! This is a great side dish to serve with any meal.

Photography Credit: Elise Bauer

Featured in 13 Quick & Easy Weeknight Meals with Chicken Broth

Our favorite way of preparing angel hair nests is a Mexican dish called “sopa seca de fideo.” It’s a lot like rice pilaf, but made with thin noodles instead of rice.

My mother makes this dish at least once a month and we were raised just calling it by the noodle name, vermicelli. All you have to do is say that word and the collective eyes of our family light up with happy anticipation.

Our Favorite Videos Get Recipe »

What does Sopa Seca de Fideo mean?

The name “sopa seca de fideo” translates to “dry soup with noodles.” It’s not soup, it’s called a “dry soup” because the noodles absorb all of the wonderful rich stock, making the noodles taste more delicious than you can possibly imagine.

What Are Angel Hair Nests?

The dish is made with thin noodles, angel hair pasta or vermicelli. Although it can be made with straight noodles, we always make fideo with the twirled angel hair nests. It’s pretty, easy to cook, and easier to serve that way — one nest, one serving.

Our favorite brand of angel hair nests is De Cecco. They have an 8.8 ounce package that works perfectly for this recipe.

If you can’t find angel hair nests at the market, you can make fideo with straight vermicelli pasta. Just break up the pasta in 3 to 4 inch long segments and cook the same way as you would the nests.

How To Make Sopa Seca de Fideo

To make sopa seca de fideo, brown angel hair nests in a hot pan, remove them, simmer tomatoes, onions, and broth, then return the nests to the pan with the broth, cover the pan and let the noodles cook until they’ve absorbed the liquid in the pan.

Browning the the pasta creates warm nutty flavor notes that you can’t get otherwise. It’s like toasted versus plain bread.

The trick to a great sopa seca de fideo is the chicken broth. In the hundreds of times we’ve made this dish over the last fifty years, we’ve used bouillon (Better than Bouillon), boxed broth, and homemade chicken stock.

While bouillon and the boxes work fine, nothing beats homemade stock for this recipe. It brings a richness that can’t be had any other way. So if you try it, I strongly urge you to use homemade stock!

What to Serve with Sopa Seca de Fideo

Think of this dish as you would rice pilaf. It goes with almost anything. We serve it alongside steak, pork chops, fried fish, and chicken. Because we make it with chicken stock, it is especially good with fried or roasted chicken dishes. It also works well as a side to classic Mexican dishes, as an alternative to Spanish or Mexican rice.

More Angel Hair Pasta Dishes to Try