30 Kid-Friendly Recipes You Can Make From the Ingredients in Your Pantry

It certainly doesn’t hurt that this lemony pasta goes from pan to table in 15 minutes. For brownie points, you could even let your kid pick the noodle shape. (Any kind will work.)

You’ll love using up leftover rice, they’ll love the crispy bits of bacon and salty sauce. (If you’re all out of eggs, skip ’em.)

If you have flour, cheese and a can of tomatoes, you have the makings of the ultimate kid-pleasing dinner. Any toppings (or no toppings) will do.

This one relies on the ultra-convenient rotisserie chicken, but any leftover shredded chicken can replace it. Set the toppings out for a build-your-own taco night and everyone can choose their favorites.

It’s a classic for a reason, right? Use jarred marinara sauce and dig that ground beef out of the back of your freezer—dinner’s on in 30 minutes.

It looks a lot like the stuff from the blue box, but it tastes even better.

A surefire way to get your kids to eat “those black things” is to pair them with other well-loved veggies. Best of all, stuffed sweet potatoes can be modified with everything from frozen corn to broccoli to ranch dressing.

Stir-fries are another versatile (and fast!) dinner idea. Oh, your kid hates bell peppers? No big deal, trade them for another crisp and sweet veggie, like carrots.

Nothing against regular burgers, but both cauliflower and sweet potatoes keep a lot longer than ground meat. Plus, it’s an easy way to get more nutrition into everyone’s diet.

This is just like fancy mac and cheese, with a mere six ingredients to boot. (The count is even lower if you leave out the “bits,” aka black pepper.)

Breakfast for dinner is an easy win, and they’ll be blown away that you made hash browns in a waffle iron.

Oh, your kids hate kale? Use spinach. They hate that, too? Try broccoli. What we’re saying is, the sky is the limit.

It’s all about the sweet and tangy honey mustard sauce. Everything else is totally swappable: breasts for thighs, green beans for Brussels sprouts, you get the idea.

Inexpensive cuts of meat—like pork shoulder—are a pantry cook’s best friend. And if you put it in a taco, you’ll win over the whole family at dinnertime.

Think of pasta salad like a blank slate for pantry ingredients. You can go wild with whatever veggies, beans and protein you have on hand.

You have eggs in your fridge, right? You’re one step closer to a creamy, kid-pleasing pasta dinner. (Go easy on the red pepper flakes, of course.)

If your first thought is, my kid would never eat that, think again. It’s really nothing more than a chicken soup base (carrots, celery, onions, noodles, broth) with sausage meatballs instead. You can leave the kale out or swap it for spinach if you’d like.

Believe it or not, you probably have the makings for a batch of pancakes in your pantry already. Serve them with any fruit and lots of maple syrup.

These waffles are made with cheddar, but any cheese will work—even the pre-shredded kind.

OK, it’s not going to win you any awards for green vegetables. But if you’re trying to win the parent of the year award, on the other hand…

You just can’t go wrong with chicken noodle soup. We made it even easier by adapting it to the slow cooker.

If regular chili is too exotic for your kids, try a white chili. It’s just as easy to make with canned staples, but a bit more mild for little taste buds.

Chicken soup, meet potato gnocchi. There’s nothing not to like about pillows of doughy pasta.

Hold the dipping sauce, unless you’ve been blessed with children who will eat blue cheese.

A can of whole tomatoes and some store-bought chicken stock will take you far. You don’t have to serve this in mini mason jars, but it sure is cute.

In this 35-minute recipe, everything comes together in a single pot. Bonus: You can use whatever type of milk or cream you have available in the fridge.

Memorize this formula: pasta + canned tomatoes + cheese = baked ziti. Everything else is optional.

Cauliflower holds up nicely in the fridge, so it’s an excellent choice when you’re not running to the store all the time. It also blends seamlessly into mac and cheese. (Just sayin’).

When you’re not sure what to do with the chicken you’ve been hoarding in your freezer, coat it in garlicky breadcrumbs and watch it disappear.

A kid-friendly way to serve chickpeas? Mash them up with whatever herbs or greens you have and turn them into falafel. Just tell them they’re a cool cousin of chicken nuggets.