How about some Cheeseburger Soup for less than $1.00 per person?
It’s a real food recipe that most everyone will love. It’s full of nourishing goodness. After all, there’s chicken broth and carrots in it, not to mention delicious beef, cheese, milk, and sour cream. It’s a full meal all on its own. Just like all of the recipes I share, this one won’t appear to anyone as “health food.” It’s simply delicious food. Comfort food. And yep, it just so happens to be healthy.
I found that this recipe yielded six hearty servings. I did the math on it, and can declare it to be a Dollar Menu Dish. Technically, it cost me just over a dollar per person to feed this to my family. I decided, eh, it counts. :) So what does it mean that this meal costs about a dollar per person? It means that healthy eating doesn’t have to be expensive! I love it that there are so many economical ways to feed a family well.
If you don’t mind adding a little extra expense to this soup, and you really want to make it appealing to those among you who just might be afraid of anything healthy – try adding 1/4 – 1/2 pound of chopped, cooked bacon. Then it becomes Bacon Cheeseburger Soup, and who wouldn’t want to eat that? By the way: Bacon is real food. Hallelujah!
Cheeseburger Soup
- ½ pound ground beef
- ½ cup chopped onion
- ¾ cup shredded carrots
- 1 teaspoon dried basil
- 1 teaspoon dried parsley
- 3 cups chicken broth
- salt and pepper to taste
- 1½ cups milk
- 5 cups potatoes cut into chunks
- 2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
- ¼ cup sour cream
- In a large pot, brown hamburger meat with onions, carrots, basil, and parsley.
- Once thoroughly cooked, add chicken broth and potatoes.
- Salt and pepper to taste.
- Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium while potatoes cook, about ten minutes.
- Once the potatoes are tender, add milk, stirring and cooking until bubbly - about two minutes. Remove from heat.
- Add cheese and sour cream, stirring until melted. Serve.
Looking for more meal ideas that use healthy, real food ingredients and cost less than one dollar per plate? Here’s what I’ve shared so far:
- Hearty Chili
- Spanish Rice
- Pasta Alfredo
- Crock Pot Barbecue Chicken
- Crock Pot Beef Stew
- Easy Chicken Pot Pie
- Chili Mac
- Breakfast Pizza
- Dark Chocolate Almond Granola
- Black Bean Salsa
Have you found ways to keep real food eating within a reasonable budget for your family?
I have a very similar recipe…it is oh so good and warm and cozy on a winter day!! We use small noodles instead of potatoes. I’ll try your exact recipe next time!! Thank you for reminding me of it!
Ooh, I like the small noodle idea! I also thought subbing rice for the potatoes sounded good. :)
Now I know what I’m making for supper tomorrow! Thanks!
Yum,we might have this for lunch today.
Cheeseburger soup is in our regular meal rotation, it’s a family favorite!
yummy! we make something similar, too- except i add sausage spices (fennel, thyme, etc.) to the hamburger while it’s cooking (instead of basil and parsley). And sometimes i swap out sweet potatoes for the white potatoes, depending on what we have :-) Thanks for sharing!
I love your recipes as well as your help in getting my family eating real foods. I started preparing only real foods on dec 30 2013. I have lost 5 pounds, I have so much more energy and I require less sleep. Thank you for your love and support.
just made a big pot of soup yesterday..paired with a loaf of homemade bread with butter i figured mine cost my family..1.13 a person…for 9 of us!a healthy nourishing meal that fills up all of us(including 2 teenage boy and hubby)i dont think there is a better deal!!oh and i made a double batch of your raspberry oatmeal bars..a huge hit!!!if i can feed 7 kids and me and hubs healthy and not break the bank..anyone can!!thanks for all the inspiration!!!
I’m having trouble pinning this recipe and sharing it on facebook. Anyone else?
YUM. I love that this doesn’t require any “odd” ingredients, just stuff we always have on hand.
I would suggest the cooks “temper” the sour cream first to avoid it curdling by putting cold cream directly in hot soup. To temper cream, you just take a few tablespoons of your hot broth and stir it into your 1/4 cup of cream. Then add the cream to the soup pot. This warms up the cream just enough that it won’t curdle when hitting the hot soup and makes it MUCH easier to blend in.
Can’t wait to try this one! Especially coming down off the sub-zero temps we’ve had lately!
This is so funny, Laura! I JUST made this for the first time for my family LAST NIGHT. I just subbed hash browns for the cubed potatoes. I thought it was good. Great minds think alike…
I made this tonight and is was really wonderful – thanks for sharing your recipe!
We made this tonight too! It was so good! I will definitely make this again. Loved it!
I tried macaroni because I had it in the pantry and I was out of potatoes. It was fantastic!
We made this last week. Another simple & delicious recipe. Thanks Laura!
I made this soup last night and it was a huge hit!! My whole family, including my picky eater, loved it!! I will definitely be making this one again!
I just made this last night. It was so good! I never knew I could cook a pot of soup in such a short period of time. It was a welcome change to our usual cold weather foods–chicken soup, chili or chicken & sausage gumbo. Thanks so much for sharing, Laura!
I tried this recipe last week and my family really liked it! Leftovers were great too! I will definitely be added to our menu rotation. Thanks!
How Many servings does this make? Thank you.
About 6. :)
This was great! Made it last Mon. when we had one of those “Polar Vortex” days and a couple kids w/ the flu (not stomach). Everyone gobbled it up, but since i made an enormous batch there were leftovers! So I got to eat it all week when I had the sore throat that came w/ the flue and it felt so soothing.
I made this for my neighbor and I a couple months ago and we all loved it! I am making it again today for dinner.
I didn’t have sour cream (we don’t eat it at our house), so I left it out and the soup still turned out great.
This is almost identical to my recipe. I usually just slice my carrots instead of shredding (faster and easier! :) ) and add more then the recipe calls for since they are a favorite veggie.
Yum yum a favorite around here.
We made this tonight, and I am so glad that we did! Thank you so much for posting this recipe, I can’t wait to make it again!
How do you think this would taste using beef broth instead of chicken stock?
This was amazing. The end. ;)
I made this last night for the first time and it turned out great. I used frozen ground chicken that I had on hand and I always use plain Greek yogurt in place of sour cream. I only had taco cheese on hand so I used that instead of cheddar. My husband put a squeeze siracha sauce in his and it made it taste almost like a taco soup. Very good. Will try again with noodles next time.
I made this last night for the first time and it turned out great. I used frozen ground chicken that I had on hand and I always use plain Greek yogurt in place of sour cream. I only had taco cheese on hand so I used that instead of cheddar. My husband put a squeeze of siracha sauce in his and it made it taste almost like a taco soup. Very good. Will try again with noodles next time.
I think it would taste just as delicious!
I remembered seeing this recipe here and thought it would be a great way to “recycle” leftover hamburgers from a family cookout. It is simmering right now. Yucky, rainy weather here so a perfectly cozy meal for such a night!
I am not sure what we did wrong, but it was not all that great. We will try again and maybe tweak a few things.
This recipe is delicious! We just tried it tonight. We used beef stock and 1 whole onion instead. We added Lots of salt. Garlic might even be a good addition. Thank you for sharing! This is going in the archives