Barley Vegetable Soup

Welcome to my life.

Sometimes I feel like I just can't make anyone happy at mealtimes. Okay, so that's a slight exaggeration, but I really, really get tired of fighting with my kids at meals. I know they don't like most soups. But I'm not living off Chicken-less Noodle Soup my whole life - and I'm not letting them, either.

Fortunately for me, I do have one someone on my side most of the time - The Honey. He likes almost everything I cook, and will only look askance if I have done something like... puree a vegetable soup. Although I like it creamy with red pepper flakes, to him it's not soup if it doesn't have chunks in it. So we eat lots of chunky vegetable soups, much to the dismay of Horse Lover and The Monkey. I make them bread so they won't go to bed hungry, and maybe one day they'll learn to love the veggies like I do...

This particular soup was very tasty. It's not got any thickeners in it (like corn starch or flour) so if you like a good, runny soup broth, this will hit the spot. However, it does have barley in it and I can't even begin to tell you where to buy barley if you don't already have it. I got mine years ago from someone who was moving and couldn't take her food storage with her. Perhaps a health food store? If you know, feel free to comment with suggestions!


Barley Vegetable Soup
(I didn't measure the yield on this recipe, but the entire pot is about 675 calories and I'm guessing that you would get about 6 adult servings - that comes out to 112 calories/bowl.)

4 c. beef broth
1/2 c. barley
1 c. vegetable juice (like V-8)
1 stalk celery
1 medium onion
1 zucchini
1/2 green bell pepper
1 can diced tomatoes
1/2 c. fresh cilantro
1 tsp. thyme
2 cloves garlic
2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
Optional: 1/4 tsp. red pepper flakes

This recipe isn't going to need much in the way of pictures for the "how to" part of it. I mean, really. You're throwing veggies in a pot and cooking it till they're done. Rocket science, right? However, if you've never seen barley before, I'm going to educate you.

Here is what it looks like uncooked and hard. Nothing amazing, just another grain...

And here is what it looks like after it has simmered for about 30 minutes in beef broth. It's much more appetizing, don't you think?

As I already alluded, you start cooking this soup by simmering the barley by itself in the beef broth. In case you haven't guessed, barley takes longer to cook than the vegetables, so I like to get it out of the way before adding my other veggies. Once the barley has expanded and gotten tender, go ahead and toss in all the other ingredients. Cover and simmer until veggies are desired tenderness,