soup kitchen
Americannoun
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a place where food, usually soup, is served at little or no charge to people experiencing food insecurity.
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Military Slang. (in World War I) a mobile kitchen.
noun
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a place or mobile stall where food and drink, esp soup, is served to destitute people
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military a mobile kitchen
Etymology
Origin of soup kitchen
First recorded in 1850–55
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Dishes clatter, steam bursts from large cooking pots and music is seeping through the bustling chatter of Russian pensioners, hunched over bowls of free meals in a Saint Petersburg soup kitchen.
From Barron's • Feb. 6, 2026
Apparently not when he’s working a soup kitchen, according to these legal aces.
From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 18, 2025
Back in el-Fasher we hear appeals for help from the women clustered at the soup kitchen - any kind of help.
From BBC • Aug. 13, 2025
She still did good works, running L.A.’s largest soup kitchen during the Depression.
From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 24, 2025
“That’s your good trait. I’ve met his moms. I volunteered with them at a soup kitchen last Thanksgiving. They’re awesome people.”
From "The Miscalculations of Lightning Girl" by Stacy McAnulty
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
