Ground Beef and Barley Soup Recipe

Traditionally, beef stew is made with chuck and can be pricey for the budget-witting family. Using cheap ground beef is a great solution. Information technology's readily available and affordable too. Paired with barley and a few vegetables, this stew is just delicious!

Traditionally, beef stew is made with chuck and can be pricey for the budget-conscious family. Using inexpensive ground beef is a great solution. It's readily available and affordable too. Paired with barley and a few vegetables, this stew is simply delicious! #beef #groundbeef #barley #stew #beefstew

Every bit I write up this recipe for my Barley Ground Beef Stew, I'm thinking about how many times I opened a tin can of Campbell's Beef and Barley Soup when I was in college. It was quick and like shooting fish in a barrel and I loved it. I could take it in a thermos and swallow information technology whenever I got hungry. I learned my lesson very early that waiting in line for the microwave at the campus cafeteria was not something I enjoyed doing! The thermos saved my sanity!

We notwithstanding purchase a few cans of soup once in a while to accept some on mitt. John.due east will brand sure he always has a can of mushroom soup in the pantry. I don't brand foam of mushroom soup, so the canned stuff is as good equally it's going to get! Too, we always have some canned tomato soup also. Both him and McKenna dearest lycopersicon esculentum soup with grilled cheese. I don't mind the soup, just I do not like the taste of grilled cheese at all!

I much prefer my homemade tomato soup , because it's heartier. It's chunky and full of San Marzano Tomatoes. Final year, I even made upwardly a large batch of tomato plant soup and canned it. I thought I could convince them that homemade was better. They ate all of the homemade Canned Tomato Soup and went correct back to Campbells! I judge that simply means I have to practice more canning! Anyway, I digress!

INGREDIENTS NEEDED FOR THIS RECIPE:

Ground Beef – You will need one pound, but make sure yous get lean footing beef. Otherwise, your soup volition exist greasy. Of course, yous can drain it, but y'all can never get rid of all of the grease.
Olive Oil – I like to use olive oil to help the onions sweat. If yous use lean beef, you won't notice the extra scrap of added oil.
Vegetables – Referred to every bit a mirepoix, this recipe volition use a combination of onions, carrots, and celery.
Garlic – Fresh cloves of garlic add flavour and depth to the soup. Plus, ground beefiness loves garlic!
Herbs – Dried herbs are great in soups and stews. This one has oregano, basil, and thyme.
Tomato Paste – Employ for flavour and colour, stews are synonymous with tomato paste.
Canned Diced Tomatoes – Yous will need roughly two cups, including the juice. Store-bought is fine, but I used my homemade canned tomatoes .
Vegetable Goop – Ever utilize low sodium broth so that you can control the salt. I used vegetable, but you can utilise beef broth too.
Pearl Barley – Texture, flavour, and health benefits all come from the improver of the barley.
Water
Fresh Parsley
Common salt & Footing Black Pepper

THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF BARLEY

Barley is a grain that doesn't seem to get much attention. We love information technology, but still, we never eat it very much. In our home, it certainly does seem like a cold weather ingredient. For example, it's the star of my Warm Barley Salad with Buttered Mushrooms and Shallots . And, I used information technology in nevertheless another soup recipe, this time, it was my Squash and Kale Barley Soup .

With its chewy texture and its nutty flavour, barley is a delicious grain that can be used in a number of means, way beyond this Barley Ground Beef Stew. It is likewise a very nutritious and healthy nutrient, with lots of fiber and a number of trace minerals like selenium, manganese and phosphorus.

Barley is bachelor in two bones forms: hulled and pearl. Hulled barley has had the tough, inedible outermost hull removed simply nonetheless retains its bran and endosperm layer. It is the virtually nutritious of the two and can exist considered a whole grain. A light gilded brown in color, it'due south the nuttier and chewier version as well. In contrast, pearl barley has been polished to remove the bran and possibly even the endosperm layers, resulting in a pale, creamy-colored grain. Information technology is less chewy and cooks faster. I'grand using pearl barley in this soup.

THE HOLY TRINITY OF A GOOD SOUP

Have you lot every heard of a mirepoix? Sometimes, it's referred to as the Holy Trinity of cooking. It is a flavor base fabricated from diced vegetables cooked in some blazon of fat, ordinarily, butter or oil. The veggies are sometimes cooked for a long period of time on a very depression rut. The goal is not not brown the veggies. Other times, they are cooked on a higher heat to bring out the natural sweetness. This is unremarkably the case in soups.

A mirepoix is most often found combined with tomatoes or lycopersicon esculentum paste. This creates a darker, brown mixture called a pincage. It is a long-continuing cooking technique in French cuisine. Mirepoix is widely used to flavour a diverseness of Western dishes, such as stocks, soups, stews and sauces.

In Italian cuisine, the onions, carrots and celery are chopped to form a battuto. It is slowly cooked in butter or olive oil, becoming soffritto. Information technology is used as the base for most pasta sauces, such as ragu, but occasionally it tin can be used as the base of other dishes, such equally sautéed vegetables. Most of the time, the Italian version volition also include garlic, shallots, or even leeks.

Desire TO Brand Information technology VEGETARIAN?

Remember at the top of this post I said that y'all could brand this dish vegetarian style? Well, that's because one time the one you encounter in the photos was prepared and plated, John.e, the vegetarian commented on how expert information technology smelled and how succulent it looked. Whenever I gear up meat-based dishes, I ever feel guilty that he can't savour them. And so, I made a brand new batch, but this time, instead of ground beefiness, I used vegetarian been crumbles.

If you utilise store-bought vegetarian crumbles like Gardein , Morn Star , or Across Meat , you can treat them all just like the ground beefiness. You will not need to fry them until the pink is gone, only heat them though just the aforementioned. Read the instructions on the package. Other than that, you can follow the recipe exactly every bit written.

If, all the same, you want to use textured vegetable protein in a dry version, y'all can do that equally well. I accept been using the dry format much more than lately. It's non only cheaper, just it has less additives. We purchase information technology from Good Rebel in Toronto. The merely thing differently y'all demand to do is to add together 1 cup of the product to the skillet with the olive oil and ane cup of water. Once the water evaporates, continue on with the recipe as written. Easy correct!?

OTTAWA VALLEY MEATS

Barley Ground Beef Stew was prepared with 100% grass-fed Black Angus lean ground beef . Sounds pretty fancy, doesn't it? It's not really. What it means is that the beefiness is sourced from a cow known as the Black Angus. The beef develops with more marbling than other types of beef. Marbling is the fatty that you see running through steaks. It improves flavour, makes the beefiness more than tender, and keeps it moist while cooking, especially when frying or searing.

Just 1 pound of beef will make enough for iv pretty hefty servings. I source ground beefiness from Ottawa Valley Meats . The beefiness is completely antibiotic and hormone-free. And, of class, for me, it's local! Yous should always buy your food as local as you lot mayhap tin. If for no other reason, information technology just tastes meliorate! And, considering information technology's and then lean, you won't need to drain the grease!

If you are in Ontario, be sure to cheque out Ottawa Valley Meats. I absolutely love the quality of the beef, as well as the chicken and the seafood besides! The prices are very competitive and they evangelize correct to your door! It'southward a great way to stock upwardly, especially with the upcoming colder months when everyone seems to cook heartier meals!

HOW TO Brand BARLEY Ground BEEF STEW

Before yous practise anything the vegetables and barley, yous must cook the beef. It's really simple. Add the ground and olive oil to a large, heavy-bottomed soup pot. Over medium estrus, cook the beef, stirring and breaking it into chunks until no pinkish is visible. Next, add together in the onions, carrots, celery, salt, and ground black pepper. Stir to combine and melt for 3-5 minutes. Finally, add in the garlic, oregano, basil, and thyme. Stir and cook for 2 more than minutes.

Next, add the lycopersicon esculentum paste. Stir to distribute throughout the vegetables. Add the vegetable broth, and h2o. Bring to a boil, cover and cook for 15 minutes. Finally, add in the diced tomatoes with the juice and the barley. Stir well to combine. Place a lid on the pot and continue to melt for 30 minutes. Lastly, gustation and arrange seasonings if needed and stir in the fresh chopped parsley. Serve immediately.

LEFTOVERS AND/OR FREEZING

This recipe does make about half-dozen servings, which might exist too much or as well footling, depending on the size of your family unit. The recipe can easily be halved or even doubled. Merely be sure to apply a actually big soup pot if yous're doubling this recipe! In one case anybody has had thier make full, you might have some leftovers. If so, y'all tin transfer the cooled stew to a food-safe container and store it in the fridge. I volition proceed for 3-four days. Otherwise, freeze it and it will last for 3 months.

Here's the thing about barley – fifty-fifty one time it'southward fully cooked through, it will go along to absorb liquid. That is why it is perfect for a stew, which is supposed to exist thick anyway. If you exercise refrigerate or freeze the leftovers, yous may demand to add a flake of water to the stew when re-heating. Showtime with merely a quarter of a loving cup of h2o at a time to avoid turning the stew into a soup! Of course, if you add more h2o, y'all will demand to re-flavor too.

Barley Basis Beef Stew

Traditionally, beefiness stew is made with chuck and tin can exist pricey for the budget-conscious family. Using inexpensive footing beef is a groovy solution. Information technology'southward readily available and affordable too. Paired with barley and a few vegetables, this stew is simply delicious!

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Prep Time fifteen mins

Melt Time 1 hr 10 mins

Full Fourth dimension 1 hr 25 mins

Servings half dozen servings

Calories 224 kcal

1 pound lean ground beefiness
ii tablespoons olive oil
i large onion, finely chopped
2 medium carrots, peeled and cubed
2 stalks celery, sliced
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/two teaspoon footing blackness pepper
ii cloves garlic, minced
ane/2 teaspoon stale oregano
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 teaspoon stale basil
i/iv loving cup tomato paste
4 cups depression sodium vegetable stock
two cups water
two cups canned diced tomatoes, with juice
ane cup pearl barley, rinsed well
one/four cup fresh parsley, chopped

Add the ground and olive oil to a large, heavy-bottomed soup pot. Over medium heat, cook the beef, stirring and breaking it into chunks until no pink is visible.
Side by side, add in the onions, carrots, celery, salt, and ground black pepper. Stir to combine and cook for 3-5 minutes.
Finally, add in the garlic, oregano, basil, and thyme. Stir and melt for 2 more minutes.
Next, add the tomato plant paste. Stir to distribute throughout the vegetables.
Add together the vegetable broth, and water. Bring to a boil, cover and melt for 15 minutes.
Finally, add in the diced tomatoes with the juice and the barley. Stir well to combine. Place a lid on the pot and go on to cook for 30 minutes.
Lastly, gustation and conform seasonings if needed and stir in the fresh chopped parsley. Serve immediately.