Cooking with Kids-Vegetable Beef Soup Recipe
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Cooking with kids is a great activity. Vegetable beef soup is a big hit with the kids! Just use whatever vegetables you have a pound of ground beef to help the kids make a super tasty and healthy meal in the kitchen. For more soup recipe ideas to inspire you, check this out.
We make lots of soups around Little Sprouts because they are healthy, the kids love them, and many different things can be used to make them. Soup is a “whatever you have on hand” kinda dish. Soup is one of the most popular dishes on my menu. A great comfort food dish for the whole family. And teaching kids to cook this way has a ton of benefits for them and your program.
Beef soup for toddlers
The basics for making up soup recipes starts with your main item. This can be beans, meat or grain. For our daycare menu, we usually start with chicken or ground beef.
Once you have your main item chosen, the soup can be prepared basically the same way every time. You should choose a starch before you begin cooking as well. If I use noodles, I will usually not add potatoes to the soup.
Soup recipes for kids
First, chop an onion. As much as my daughter hates to admit it, most good dishes start with an onion.
Second, heat up your soup pot with a tablespoon or two of oil. We use olive oil at Little Sprouts most of the time.
Next, cook the onion on low until it’s translucent.
Then, add meat and cook and stir it until browned.
Now, add your longest cooking vegetables such as potatoes, carrots, and celery.

Next, add some soup stock or water and bring soup to a boil. Cook until vegetables are fork-tender.
Then, add shorter cooking vegetables such as peas, corn, broccoli, or whatever you have on hand that you want to use.
And, add salt and pepper to taste, a clove of crushed garlic, and a half a teaspoon to a teaspoon of thyme, sage, oregano, or another herb you like.
Finally, cook until all veggies are done.
Making whatever you have on hand soup recipes for kids is soup-er easy using these steps.
For this soup, we used potatoes, corn, carrots, and green beans. The meat was ground beef. It was delicious!
Recipes for kids to cook
We have a ton of recipes kids can make on the blog. Click on cooking with kids on the menu to find more recipes to cook with kids or click on the highlighted link.
Little Sprouts Vegetable Beef Soup
Ingredients
- 2 T. Olive oil
- 1 onion
- 2 potatoes
- 1 pound ground beef
- 3 carrots
- 1/2 c. peas
- 1 c. corn
- 1 c. fresh green beans
- 4 c. chicken stock
- salt and pepper to taste
- 1 tsp. thyme
- 1 clove garlic
Instructions
- Chop onion.
- Add olive oil to pan and heat on medium heat.
- Add onion to pan, cook and stir until translucent.
- Add ground beef and cook until browned.
- Add green beans, diced carrots, diced potatoes, and chicken stock.
- Bring soup to a boil and cook until potatoes are fork tender.
- Add peas, corn, crushed garlic, thyme, salt and pepper.
- Cook until vegetables are done.
More Soup Recipes:
If you are someone who can’t get enough soup like me, you’re going to love these recipes too:



I love when kids get involved in the kitchen – and this looks like a delicious recipe to boot!
It’s super tasty, we make it all the time. Thanks for checking it out! 🙂