Cheeseburger Soup

10 servings
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 45 minutes
Total Time 1 hour

Easy Cheeseburger Soup is a mouthwatering cheesy, beefy, creamy potato soup recipe. The ultimate go-to comfort food all year long, ready in just one hour!

Easy Taco Soup is one of the best busy weeknight Soup Recipes the whole family loves! This tasty Cheeseburger Potato Soup is just as easy and perfect for dinner, potlucks, or tailgates.

Cheeseburger Soup in pot with hamburger bun croutons and ladle

CHEESEBURGER SOUP

Turning easy dinners, like tacos or enchiladas, into a tasty soup is a great way to switch up weeknight meals! This Cheeseburger Soup tastes as mind-blowing as it sounds. Packed with cheddar cheese and ground beef, this creamy potato soup will be your new go-to family favorite any night of the week.

Easy to Make, Inexpensive Ingredients!

Cheeseburger Soup is ready in under an hour with budget friendly ingredients like ground beef, russet potatoes, and canned cheese soup. It’s a great recipe to use leftovers and whatever is in your pantry. 

This soup does take two pots to make as seen below, because we’re making a roux with a homemade cheese sauce. You can cut down on time with pre-made swaps too.

Add veggies like canned diced tomatoes, swap in Grilled Chicken for the beef, or use Velvetta cheese instead of the cheese soup. It’s so easy to make your own!

Ingredients for Cheeseburger Soup

The best part of this easy Cheeseburger Soup recipe is that you can make it on the stovetop, the crock pot, or an Instant Pot, depending on how much hands on time you have to prepare dinner. See the bottom of this post for Slow Cooker Cheeseburger Soup and Instant Pot Cheeseburger Soup variations!

MORE  DELICIOUS AND EASY SOUP RECIPES

What to serve with your soup?

For a hearty, yet light, main dish, serve Cheeseburger Soup with Dinner Rolls and Roasted Broccoli or Big Mac Salad. This hamburger soup is a great side dish along with other All-American dinner favorites like Cheeseburger Hamburger Helper or any of these delicious Sloppy Joe Recipes!

Can you Freeze Cheeseburger Soup Ahead of Time?

Cream and cheese based soups like Cheeseburger Soup don’t freeze well, since the dairy separates as it reheats. To freeze Cheeseburger Soup ahead of time, prepare up until you begin the butter-flour mixture. Cool and freeze soup without dairy. Thaw overnight and reheat on the stove top. Once hot, prepare the butter-flour mixture and add cheddar soup, milk, and cheese as normal.

Cheeseburger Soup in wooden bowl with cheese and hamburger bun croutons

VARIATIONS ON CHEESEBURGER SOUP

  • Bacon: Make a Bacon Cheeseburger Soup by adding 6-8 slices cooked bacon with the potatoes and carrots. Serve with bacon bits as a garnish.
  • Potatoes: Swap out the russet potatoes with Yukon gold potatoes or red potatoes. You can also use a bag of shredded hash browns, just add them in frozen and allow to cook with the carrots.
  • Veggies: Add canned or frozen veggies you have on like corn, broccoli, bell peppers, diced tomatoes, or green chiles to make this Cheeseburger Soup more hearty.
  • Cheese: Slice up a block of Velvetta cheese, use canned cheese soup or homemade Cheddar Cheese Soup to replace the shredded cheddar cheese.
  • Toppings: Top your Cheeseburger Soup with sour cream, pickles, green onions, diced jalapeños, diced tomatoes, or croutons. Try it with the sesame seed burger croutons from Big Mac Pasta Salad!

Ladle of Cheeseburger SoupSlow Cooker Cheeseburger Soup

  • Sauté beef and onions with seasonings in a large skillet over medium-high heat until meat is browned and onions are translucent.
  • Drain beef mixture and place in slow cooker.
  • Add potatoes, carrots, celery, and broth to the crock pot. Stir to combine.
  • Cover and cook on low for 4-5 hours on low, or 2-3 hours on high.
  • In a saucepan over medium heat, whisk flour and butter until butter is cooked. Whisk in cheese soup then milk, one at a time, until fully combined.
  • Stir in cheese soup mixture to the slow cooker. Cover and cook on high for 30 minutes. 
  • Garnish with shredded cheddar cheese and serve.

Instant Pot Cheeseburger Soup

    • Turn Instant Pot to Sauté function and brown beef with seasonings and onions. Drain grease.
    • Deglaze pot with 1 cup broth to remove any browned bits sticking to bottom and sides.
    • Add potatoes, carrots, celery, and remaining broth to Instant Pot.
    • Seal lid and pressure valve. Cook on Manual High for 5 minutes and naturally release pressure for 10 minutes before quick release.
    • Prepare flour-butter mixture with cheese soup and milk as usual.
    • Turn Instant Pot on Soup Function and stir in milk-cheese soup mixture. Simmer 1-2 minutes.
    • Serve with shredded cheese on top.

OTHER HEARTY SOUP RECIPES TO TRY

HOW TO STORE CHEESEBURGER SOUP

  • Serve: Cheeseburger Soup is best served hot and fresh. Be sure to stir occasionally if it is sitting for a while, and don’t keep at room temperature for more than 2 hours.
  • Store: Cool Cheeseburger Soup completely before storing in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 4 days. Reheat on the stove top, stirring occasionally, until hot to serve.
  • Freeze: Place cooled Cheeseburger Soup in a sealed container and freeze for up to 3 months. For best results, freeze without milk and cheese mixture or stir frequently when reheating.

Cheeseburger Soup in Red Dutch Oven

Pin this recipe now to remember it later

Pin Recipe

Cheeseburger Soup

Easy Cheeseburger Soup is a mouthwatering cheesy, beefy, creamy potato soup recipe. The ultimate go-to comfort food all year long, ready in just one hour!
Yield 10 servings
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 45 minutes
Total Time 1 hour
Course Dinner
Cuisine American
Author Sabrina Snyder

Ingredients
 

  • 1 pound ground beef , (80/20)
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon coarse ground black pepper
  • 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
  • 1 yellow onion , chopped
  • 3 medium carrots , diced
  • 2 stalks celery , diced
  • 4 medium russet potatoes , diced (about 4 cups)
  • 4 cups chicken broth

Cheese Sauce:

  • 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
  • 1/4 cup flour
  • 3 cups whole milk
  • 2 cups cheddar cheese , freshly shredded
  • 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon coarse ground black pepper

Instructions

  • Add ground beef, salt, black pepper, thyme and onions to a large dutch oven on medium heat and cook, breaking it apart, for 5-6 minutes until well browned and the onions are translucent.
  • Add the carrots, celery and potatoes to the pot with the beef and onion mixture and stir well.
  • Add in the chicken broth and bring to a boil.
  • Reduce to a simmer and cook for 12-15 minutes until the carrots and potatoes are tender.

Cheese Sauce:

  • In a second pot add the butter and flour on medium heat.
  • Whisk well until the flour is cooked and well mixed with the butter.
  • Whisk in the cheddar cheese until smooth then slowly whisk in the whole milk until smooth.

To Finish:

  • Add the cheese sauce into the soup and stir until creamy.
  • Top with cheddar cheese and croutons if desired and serve.

Nutrition

Calories: 370kcal | Carbohydrates: 25g | Protein: 19g | Fat: 22g | Saturated Fat: 12g | Cholesterol: 74mg | Sodium: 919mg | Potassium: 778mg | Fiber: 2g | Sugar: 6g | Vitamin A: 3578IU | Vitamin C: 14mg | Calcium: 282mg | Iron: 2mg

Cheeseburger Soup collage

About the Author: Sabrina Snyder

Sabrina is a professionally trained Private Chef of over 10 years with ServSafe Manager certification in food safety. She creates all the recipes here on Dinner, then Dessert, fueled in no small part by her love for bacon.

Sabrina Snyder is a professionally trained personal and private chef of over 10 years who is the creator and developer of all the recipes on Dinner, then Dessert.

She is also the author of the cookbook Dinner, then Dessert – Satisfying Meals Using Only 3, 5 or 7 Ingredients, published by Harper Collins.

She started Dinner, then Dessert as a business in her office as a lunch service for her coworkers who admired her lunches before going to culinary school and becoming a full time personal chef and private chef.

As a personal chef Sabrina would cook for families one day a week and cook their entire week of dinners. All grocery shopping, cooking and cleaning was done along with instructions on reheating. As a private chef she cooked for private parties and cooked in family homes in the evenings for families on a nightly basis after working as a personal chef during the day.

Sabrina has been certified as a ServSafe Manager since 2007 and was a longstanding member of the USPCA Personal Chef Association including being on the board of the Washington DC Chapter of Chefs in the US Personal Chef Association when they won Chapter of the year.

As a member of the community of food website creators Sabrina Snyder has spoken at many conferences regarding her experiences as a food writer including the Indulge Food Conference, Everything Food Conference, Haven Food Conference and IACP Annual Food Professionals Conference.

Sabrina lives with her family in sunny California.

Dinner, then Dessert, Inc. owns the copyright on all images and text and does not allow for its original recipes and pictures to be reproduced anywhere other than at this site unless authorization is given. If you enjoyed the recipe and would like to publish it on your own site, please re-write it in your own words, and link back to my site and recipe page. Read my disclosure and copyright policy. This post may contain affiliate links.

Categories

Leave a comment & rating

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recipe Rating




This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Comments

  1. AH-MAZ-ING! Absolutely killer flavor and such a great recipe to make extra to eat for lunch later in the week.

  2. Hi, Sabrina! Love your website! The Cheeseburger Soup sounds wonderful and I’d love to try it. However, I’m confused about the Cheese Sauce instructions/ingredients – does it call for condensed cheese soup and cheese sauce…? I don’t actually see condensed soup in either ingredient list, either. Please clarify for me. Thanks so much!

    1. So sorry, this wasn’t edited correctly when it was posted. The recipe used shredded cheddar cheese. The recipe card should read correctly now. Enjoy!

    1. I decided to try it with shredded cheese instead and forgot to edit. I’m sorry but the recipe card should read correctly now.

  3. Am I missing an ingredient somewhere? In the instructions, it says to add condensed cheese soup to the cheese sauce, but the ingredients doesn’t call for that. Or can you substitute the canned for the homemade?
    Why would you need to make a roux with cheese, if you are using canned soup thinned with milk as you have in the instructions?

  4. I do not see condensed cheese soup in the ingredient list but it is in the instructions to add it to the cheese sauce. Is it a necessary ingredient?

  5. Sabrina,

    Is there condensed cheese soup in this recipe? I am confused. I would love to try your recipe. I see that you talk about condensed cheese soup in your post, and see it again in the instructions of the recipe but do not see it listed in the ingredient list.

    1. After retesting, I decided to use shredded cheddar cheese instead to make the sauce. I’ve edited the recipe card to read correctly now.

  6. Your Cheeseburger soup posted today, in the instructions for cheese sauce #3 says to add condensed cheese soup, but not listed in the ingredients. Was that an error?

  7. In the cheese sauce instructions you added a can of condensed cheese soup, was this an error or in place of the shredded cheddar cheese. Thanks.

  8. Hello! This recipe is incomplete. In the instructions for the Cheese Sauce it says to add the canned cheese sauce to the pan. However, there is no mention of canned Cheese Sauce in the ingredients list. How much do we use?

  9. I belong to a group of ten retired teachers who have met monthly for 45 years. Now when the order of the day is to meet in outdoor spaces six feet apart, it’s my turn to bring dessert in October. Do you have any suggestions for our outdoor gathering? Thanks Sabrina!

    1. Oh my gosh, how fun! I’ve got a few sheet cake recipe that make feeding a crowd much easier, either chocolate or cherry chocolate. I also just posted Halloween Pretzel Hugs that are super easy to make for something more festive for the season. Have fun and stay safe!