Beefy Tomato Soup is one of our most popular soup recipes! Ground beef and pasta in an addicting tomato cream sauce, and it’s ready in 30 minutes!
We love making this easy, cozy soup on busy nights or for a comforting weekend meal. All you need is crackers or buttered bread for dipping, and a crisp salad on the side if you get the urge.
An Easy Soup Recipe That’s Done In 30 Minutes!
Because I like to try and use what we have in the house, I opened the freezer, the fridge and all the cabinets to take stock of what we had on hand. Sometimes going back out to the grocery store is just not something I want to do.
I grabbed some ground beef from the freezer, cream cheese from the fridge, onions, basil and garlic from the cabinets and got to work.
Beefy Tomato Soup has become one of our most popular recipe on our site and for good reason. It’s really easy to make, it’s done in less than 30 minutes and it’s so creamy and comforting, everyone gobbles it up.
This soup recipe is another way I like to use spaghetti sauce in recipes as a short cut and a boost of flavor. And probably one of my favorite ways, too. Also a jar of spaghetti sauce is usually something we have in the pantry so it’s an easy ingredient to use in recipes like this.
This beef and macaroni soup gets so thick it’s almost like a beef goulash. Some people have said that it’s similar to a homemade hamburger helper once the noodles soak up all the broth.
How Do You Make Beefy Tomato Soup?
Gather your ingredients together and start by cooking the onion and garlic in olive oil. Next brown the beef, add a few seasonings then pour in chicken broth and your jar of marinara sauce.
You can still make this soup if you don’t have a jar of spaghetti sauce, just substitute a 28 ounce can of crushed tomatoes or tomato sauce if that’s what you have instead.
Give it a stir and let it simmer for 10 minutes, not a full boil, just a simmer. Stir in cream cheese to make it nice and thick, add some fresh basil and finally add in the pasta.
Can You Cook the Pasta Separately For This Soup?
You sure can. If you like your soup to have more broth, cook the noodles separately and add it in the each bowl as you serve the soup.
A lot of our readers love the way that the pasta soaks up the broth the next day (and so do we). You can always add a splash more broth upon reheating if you like. But if you really want to hang on to all that addicting, creamy tomato broth then just add cooked pasta to your bowl before serving.
Variations
We get a lot of comments about the pipette that we use in this soup. We love this pasta shape because all the creamy broth gets all up inside the pasta, so you get all of that flavor in every bite. If you can’t find that pasta shape, use elbow macaroni, shells or any other short tube pasta shape.
Many of our readers say that they add fresh spinach to this soup, or other vegetables like peas and carrots. You can also swap out the ground beef for ground turkey or pork, even some Italian sausage would be great.
Looking For More Soup Recipes?
- Creamy Potato Soup with Italian Sausage
- Split Pea and Ham Soup
- Grandma’s Pasta Fazool
- Homemade Turkey Soup
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Beefy Tomato Soup
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Total Time: 25 minutes
- Yield: 6 servings 1x
Print Recipe
Pin RecipeBeefy Tomato Soup is an easy beef and macaroni soup that your whole family will love! This soup is done and on the table in less than 30!
Ingredients
- 1 pound ground beef
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 onion, chopped
- 3 cloves of garlic, minced
- 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
- 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1 (24 ounce) jar of spaghetti sauce
- 4 cups of chicken stock
- 1/2 cup of cream cheese, at room temperature
- 1 1/2 cups elbow macaroni, shells or other short-tubed pasta
- 1/4 cup fresh chopped basil, divided
Instructions
- In a large pot heat the olive oil over medium heat.
- Add the onion and garlic to the pot and cook for 3-4 minutes, stirring, until the onion softens.
- Add the ground beef to the onions, breaking up with a spoon and cook until no longer pink. Drain any drippings if necessary. Season with the salt, pepper and oregano and stir to combine.
- Pour in the chicken stock and the pasta sauce, stir and bring to a simmer. Simmer the soup for 10-15 minutes, uncovered.
- Whisk in the cream cheese until combined, then add 2 tablespoons of the fresh basil.
- Pour in the pasta, stir and let cook for 10 minutes, covered, stirring halfway through cooking.
- Spoon into bowls and garnish with the leftover basil.
Recipe Notes
Your favorite spaghetti sauce can be used, or even a can of crushed tomatoes with a little more seasoning works!
NOTE: A few of our readers have commented that the noodles soak up all the broth when you reheat the next day. If you want the soup for leftovers with more broth, cook the pasta separately and then add it to each bowl as you heat it up! Alternately you can add another cup of broth to the soup when making.
- Category: Dinner
- Method: stove top
- Cuisine: American
I made this recipe using 99% lean ground turkey and I used less cream cheese. I have 3 college age boys. Everyone loved this recipe. I sometimes throw in some fresh spinach to get some veggies in it too. I have since given the recipe to three other people and everyone loves it. It’s just a delicious, hearty soup for a cold day.
Sounds wonderful! Thanks, Margaret for the thoughtful comment!
I just made it keto friendly by swapping out the pasta for some celery and zucchini slices. Absolutely delicious. Thanks for the inspiration. My husband devoured it.
Wow this recipe was great! I made it with ground turkey! I did one and a half recipe because I have 21,19,17,15 year olds. I also threw in a tablespoon of oregano and a tablespoon of basil. I put some crushed red pepper in the bowls for my husband and myself. This will be on my rotation for sure!
Wow, you are feeding a lot of people! We only have 2 teenage boys and we have to double this soup! Thanks for the feedback, we really appreciate it!
Absolutely delicious! I was searching for a soup recipe that used ground beef, had a tomato flavor, and noodles. This was perfect. My 2 year old loved it after finally trying the smallest piece of meat she could find. This has been added to our favouritw recipe list to make again.
I totally get that! Texture is a big thing for a lot of kids, I’m so glad you found something she liked though. It’s wonderful when you can actually cook 1 thing for dinner!
My kids loved this. My pickiest eater told me she wanted me to make it again! That is rare. Definitely a keeper! It was a bit on the salty side, so next time I will pay better attention to the salt content of the ingredients I chose to you. I like your idea of using crushed/diced tomatoes. We dipped grilled cheese in this and it was delicious. Thank you for posting so many years ago!
You’re so welcome! Grilled cheese dippers are the best!
This soup is delicious! I was looking for a way to use up some cream cheese and stumbled upon this recipe. I didn’t have enough elbow noodles so I omitted completely and added 1/2 C. of dry quinoa instead. I also used a 28oz jar of crushed tomatoes instead of the pasta sauce, It was very hearty!
Sounds delicious!
What if i try it with pulled pork?
I’m not sure how that would turn out!
This was so good that I ate way wayyyyy too much. Heed the advice of ROOM TEMP cream cheese.
We usually eat too much of this soup too! Yes, the room temp cream cheese is a must!
Outstanding as written in all variations. Easy, filling and inexpensive. Thank you for this keeper.
Thank you! We’re so glad you like it as much as we do!
Could I make this without the cream cheese divide it in half and then add the cream cheese, refrigerate the other half and add the cream cheese when I heat it the next day? I’m new to left overs but we have so much food left with less ppl in the house these days.
That sound like a lot of work, but yes you could do that! Do you have people in your house that don’t like cream cheese?
My fiance and I love this recipe! We move every couple months for his work so having something delicious and simple to make with the few kitchen supplies we can bring is a real blessing. It is becoming our go-to comfort food. Thank you for sharing it!
Wow, that’s a tough gig! We make this one a lot too for our “when we have nothing to make” nights and our boys always love it! Thank you for letting us know!
Use kite hill cream cheese and vegan meat crumble to make this vegan! I’ve done it without the meat crumble and it’s still so good!
WE. LOVE. THIS. SOUP. It’s now on heavy rotation… it’s amazing. Didn’t have cream cheese so used the same amount of sour cream – still amazing. Parmesan cheese on top is also delicious. Thank you for this! I usually double it so we can pack it for work lunches. I’m so glad to have an easy, quick, and inexpensive recipe to add to our favorites!
Wow, sour cream! I’ll have to try that! And you’re welcome, thank you for following along!
friggin AMAZING!!! tangy, creamy and cheesy! deeelicious :)
We love it too! Thanks for checking in!
I added some thyme, sage, and red pepper flakes. I also only used 1 c noodles. Turned out great
Like it pretty much i wish you make a recipes for pepper pot soup use to buy this soup through cambells soup they font sell this any more it was my favorite soup pleade make a recipes for this soup