Stone Soup by Marcia Brown

When three hungry soldiers come to a town where all the food has been hidden, they set out to make soup of water and stones, and all the town enjoys a feast.

Three soldiers came marching down the road towards a French village. The peasants seeing them coming, suddenly became very busy, for soldiers are often hungry. So all the food was hidden under mattresses or in barns. There followed a battle of wits, with the soldiers equal to the occasion. Stone soup? Why, of course, they could make a wonderful soup of stones…but, of course, one must add a carrot or tow…some meat…so it went. 
Marcia Brown has made of this old tale a very gay book, a carnival of activity, of dancing and laughter. So much goes on in the pictures that children who have once heard the story will turn to them again and again, retelling the story for themselves.