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If I had to choose between a soup or a salad for lunch everyday for the rest of my life, I would choose soup. Hands down! I just love how a steamy bowl of soup can warm you up on a cold day. Also, it’s amazing how many nutrients you can pack into one bowl of comfort food. Don’t get me wrong. I love salads too, but there’s something magical about the warmth of a soup after spending a morning outside with the kids in winter or hiking with friends on a chilly fall day.
When my kids were still babies and getting food on the table after a sleepless night seemed impossible, my good friend and I used to do a soup swap each week. We had a huge glass container that we passed back and forth filled with delicious creations. It was always exciting to see what kind of soup would arrive at my door every other week. Even though it was sometimes tough to get organized and produce a soup large enough to share, it brought me such joy to know that we could help each other out with such a simple thing. And it meant I didn’t have to think about what to make for lunch for a few days each week!
One of my favorite soups to share was this simple beef barley soup. In fact, I make this one quite often. My husband is more of a stew lover, so he especially enjoys when it thickens up overnight. You can easily thin it out a bit by adding a small amount of water or broth when reheating if you prefer it to be more “soupey”.
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Homemade Beef Barley Soup With Ground Beef
- Total Time: 1 hour
Description
Beef, veggies and barley come together as a delicious, simple and comforting soup.
Ingredients
- 500g lean ground beef
- 2 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 onion, diced
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 2 carrots, diced
- 1 stalk celery, chopped
- 1 can diced tomatoes, 28oz undrained
- 1/2 green pepper, chopped
- 1 cup green beans, chopped (fresh, frozen or canned)
- 1/2 cup corn (fresh, frozen or canned)
- 1/2 cup green peas (fresh, frozen, or canned)
- 2/3 cup pot barley
- 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
- 1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
- 2 teaspoons dried parsley
- 1 bay leaf
- salt & pepper, to taste
- 6 cups beef broth
Instructions
- Cook ground beef in large soup pot. Break it apart with a wooden spoon and cook until all the ground beef has browned.
- Drain the beef fat.
- Remove the beef from pot and set aside.
- Using same pot, add olive oil and cook onions and garlic over medium heat until softened.
- Add all remaining ingredients, including the ground beef, to the pot containing the onions and garlic.
- Bring to a boil.
- Once boiling, reduce heat and simmer for about 45 minutes with the lid on or until barley is cooked.
- Remove bay leaf.
- Serve.
Notes
Feel free to leave out any of the following: green pepper, green beans, peas, corn. Or replace with a similar vegetable that you like better.
The soup will thicken overnight. You may want to add a bit of broth or water to thin it out when reheating.
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 45 minutes
- Category: Soup
Keywords: beef barley soup
