Home » What We're Eating » One Pan Homemade Hamburger Helper

One Pan Homemade Hamburger Helper

Name: One Pan Homemade Hamburger Helper
Prep time: 5 min
Cook time: 20 min
Total time: 25 min
Yield: 4 servings
Ingredients: 1 lb. ground beef (I used 96% lean); 2 cups water; 2 cups beef broth; 1 cup uncooked wholegrain or regular elbow macaroni; 2 tablespoons minced dried onion; ½ teaspoon minced dried garlic; 1 teaspoon chili powder; ½ cup tomato paste; Salt and pepper (to taste); Optional toppings: grated cheese; parsley

Lasted edited November 2, 2018. Originally published December 21, 2016 by Blair

Jump to Recipe

A comforting, cozy and delicious hamburger helper that's not only much healthier and tastier than store bought but requires hardly any effort at all.

Total Time: 25 minutes

Jump to Recipe Print Recipe

With just 5 minutes of prep and a few pantry staples, Grandma’s One Pan Homemade Hamburger Helper is a healthy, fast, and incredibly easy comfort food dinner that the whole family will enjoy!

This Hamburger Helper is one of those simple dinners that has been a lifesaver for our busy family. It only requires one pan (which equals fewer dishes to clean up), and the meal practically cooks itself after about 5 minutes of hands-on prep.

That gives me just enough time to change a diaper, unpack the lunch boxes, and steam some broccoli before we all sit down to eat. And best of all, when the kids join us at the table, they greet their dinners with smiles instead of tears, they clean their plates, and then they often ask for more.

That’s when you’ll feel like a true success. That’s when you will know that you’ve found the best of all worlds: healthy, easy, and delicious!

This is the best of all worlds. Like that workout that you actually enjoy; the little black dress that fits you like a glove and is on sale; or the warm, gooey, zero calorie brownie that’s sitting on your plate (wait, that’s not real?!). My friends, this dinner is most definitely REAL; and it’s not too good to be true!

Ingredients For A Homemade Hamburger Helper

Ground Beef
Water
Beef Broth
Macaroni Pasta
Onion
Garlic
Tomato Paste
Chili Powder
Optional Toppings; Cheese & Parsley

When you need dinner and you need it fast this is one of my go tos. It really doesn’t get much easier than that unless you’re talking turkey sandwich or cereal for dinner. No thanks.

Here are some tips for making the best homemade hamburger helper;

Brown the beef first, this is a must as it gives the beef color and seals in the flavor.
Drain the fat. This is another important tip, it’s not only a much healthier way of cooking but it will make a huge different to the end result.
The added cheese is optional but it really makes this hamburger helper extra comforting. Go for a sharp cheddar or other good melting cheese.
Add texture, you could also add cheese and a few fresh breadcrumbs over the top and place it under the broiler for a few minutes for a crunchy, cheesy topping similar to mac and cheese.
I wouldn’t recommend freezing this as the pasta will swell and change texture.

Why We Need Meals To Be Quick And Effortless

After I had my first son, I returned to my office job full time and sent Gibbs to a neighbor’s in-home daycare so that I could commute 45 minutes to Charlottesville for work.

And while I don’t keep that schedule (or that job) anymore, I can still vividly remember the end-of-the-day struggles. For working parents with babies and toddlers, there’s just nothing worse than walking in the house at the end of a long day with an over-tired and incredibly hungry child who needs to eat ~~right now~~ an hour ago.

There were many evenings when I just couldn’t get it together. I was stressed and tired, Gibbs was picky and didn’t want to eat anything other than mac and cheese or chicken nuggets, and so we gave him what he wanted as quickly as possible before fending for ourselves with bowls of cereal or turkey sandwiches.

And like many of you out there, I had plenty of evenings where I cleaned up the dishes and felt as though I had failed…as a mom, as a wife, and as a woman. I was raised by a lady who had a homemade meal on the table each night, but I just couldn’t quite get it together with everything else that I had going on in my life. Heck, I hardly even had time to go to the grocery store, much less actually cook our food!

I quickly learned that I needed to have a plan in advance so that I could go grocery shopping once on the weekends and be set for the week. I also learned that I need a repertoire of quick-prep meals that I can pull together in less than 30 minutes from start to finish.

Any longer, and my babies would be asleep in the high chair or throwing a tantrum on the kitchen floor! And finally, I needed these meals to be full of nourishing, healthy ingredients so that I could stress less about those Cheetos the boys wanted at lunch or those cookies that they demanded for snack.

Because at the end of the day, we could all sit down together to a meal that I had cooked myself and that I could feel good about serving.

More Delicious Homemade Pasta Recipes;

Did you try this recipe? Don’t forget to rate it and leave me a comment below! You can follow me on Facebook, on Instagram, on Pinterest, and on Twitter!

4.86 from 7 votes