Black Bean and Barley Vegetable Soup

Homemade soup is something most of us really like, but it can often seem like just too much effort. If all that chopping and preparation intimidates you, this recipe might be a good one to try. Yes, there is some prep work but the end result of perhaps half an hour (and probably much less) of kitchen work will yield a huge batch of soup.

After serving the soup while the house is full of wonderful aromas, you will still have plenty to refrigerate for later microwaved bowls on busy evenings and more for taking to the office for quick lunches. Then freeze some meal-sized portions for later hectic weeknight dinners. A lot of wonderful meals for remarkably little preparation overall.

 This soup also provides a wide range of options, from using almost all "pre-made" ingredients--canned beans, frozen onions, etc.--to a completely "home-made" version; just use whatever your time and budget allow. If you have a food processor, this is a great time to use it too, for preparing everything from the onions to the cabbage.

Even the "long cook" ingredients--black beans and barley--can be made more "convenient." The beans of course can be from a can, but you can also make your own beans ahead for convenience. Buy a pound or two of dried beans and cook the entire amount according to directions on the bag. Then you can freeze the beans in 2 cup portions (approximately the amount in a 15 oz can).

Barley is not available in a can--at least not in any store I've ever been in--so you will need to cook this yourself. If you use pearl barley, the kind most often available, you could start it cooking while you are gathering all the other ingredients and getting the onions sauteed. Since the hulled form (which is healthier--hulled is to pearl for barley as brown rice is to white) will take longer to cook, you either will need to start it cooking it earlier OR you could prepare a large batch ahead of time and refrigerate or freeze just as with beans. In this approach, you'll no doubt cook the barley with water; in that case, just use the broth in place of the water in the recipe. 

Black Bean and Barley Vegetable Soup

1 c hulled or pearl barley
3 c turkey or chicken broth (OR substitute vegetable broth for a VEGAN soup)
olive oil
2 c chopped onion (may use frozen if desired)
1 c diced celery
approximately 6 c shredded cabbage (may use cole slaw mix)
2 to 3 c organic carrot juice
1 15 or 16 oz can or jar Italian seasoned diced tomatoes
2 c cooked black beans (or 15 oz can, undrained)
2 c frozen corn (no need to thaw before adding)
1/2 c chopped bell pepper (frozen diced or sliced peppers may be used)
1  1/2 c frozen chopped kale (no need to thaw before adding)
5 to 8 garlic cloves, minced
1/4 c sun-dried tomatoes, chopped
1/4 c bottled red peppers, diced (use sweet or hot depending on your taste)
1 t basil
1 t Italian seasoning
1/2 t black pepper
4 to 5 c water, enough for desired consistency

1. In a large soup pot, bring the broth and barley to a boil. Turn heat down and simmer about 25 minutes for pearl barley, about 40 to 50 minutes for hulled. (This step can be done well ahead of time, with the barley refrigerated until ready to make soup.)
2. Meanwhile, saute the onion and celery in a small amount of olive oil over medium heat.

3. When the onions are light golden in color, stir in the cabbage, cover,  and continue cooking for another 5 to 10 minutes, until the cabbage is starting to soften.
4.  Add the remaining ingredients except the water. Gradually add water to reach desired consistency.
5..  Bring mixture to a gentle boil and reduce heat to low. Continue to simmer for about 30 minutes and taste, adjusting for seasoning at that point.
6.  Add more water if desired and simmer for another 30 to 60 minutes. Serve immediately or refrigerate or freeze for later. As with most soups, this will be even better the second day.

Makes 5 to 6 quarts of soup, depending on the amount of water added. Allow 1 to 2 cups of soup per serving.

SUBSTITUTIONS:

• If you don't have carrot juice, substitute additional broth for the carrot juice and add 2 to 3 c sliced or grated carrots with the other vegetables.
• Fresh or frozen spinach, coarsely chopped, can be substituted for the kale.
• An extra can or jar of diced tomatoes can be substituted for the sundried tomatoes.

Mushroom and Barley Soup

Another winter Monday, another round of snow shoveling. Today's snow was light and fluffy, with the air temperature at a "comfortable" 20 degrees. Still, it was nice to come back into the house to the aroma of homemade soup simmering on the stove.

Soup is one of the easiest of foods to make from scratch--really!--but it also is something that is hard to pin down to specific recipes. Part of this comes from the great American propensity for wanting carefully calibrated amounts in their cooking instructions, but good soup includes ingredients that just don't come in pre-measured amounts. Just how big is a "medium onion" and is the clove of garlic listed in the ingredients as big as your thumb or just a little cashew? Even if you are using a 15 oz can of diced tomatoes and chiles, the amount of seasoning varies from brand to brand--and sometimes from one year to the next. There are two other things that make homemade soups wonderfully unique (and sometimes hard to duplicate): broth and the exact choice of ingredients.

Broth (or Stock--see NOTE below)

And then there is the base of most soups--broth. Yes, you can buy fairly standardized broth in the store, and you might even find one that you like especially well. However, the cost is generally far higher than broth you make yourself, and there still is no better broth than that coming from your own kitchen. The problem here is that every time you make broth (or better yet, save it from a prior pork or beef roast or braised chicken), the seasoning will be slightly different, the concentration varying from batch to batch. The bottom line is that every time you make soup with a different broth for the base, there will be a different flavor result. Not a problem. Instead, this is when you get to taste and adjust, taste and adjust. Not quite salty enough? Easy to resolve, just a sprinkle more. But maybe the soup needs a little more "zip." Maybe, with some recipes, that means a bit of black pepper, a splash of hot sauce or a little diced jalapeno. More often though, it might mean a tiny bit of sugar (or more sweet ingredients--see below) or a splash of vinegar or Worcestershire sauce--or maybe even soy sauce or some other favorite condiment sauce. It's your soup, so you could to play with what you add.

What if, on the other hand, the broth starts out too salty? If it is just a little over the top, you can add some beans or starchy ingredients to the soup. If the salt is just a little too strong, just adding a cup or two of unseasoned rice, pasta, barley, lentils, or potatoes to the soup may take care of the problem. If it is really salty, you might try the old remedy of cutting a large potato in perhaps two or three chunks and let them simmer for a few minutes. You remove these potatoes and discard, taking a lot of the salt with them.

It is best of course to taste the broth before adding to the soup. If you realize early on that you have an over-salt problem, you may choose to cut the broth with water (or milk for a cream soup) before starting the soup. If you don't catch the problem before adding other ingredients, you can also double the vegetable and other ingredients and increase the water accordingly.

NOTE:       Do a quick search and you'll find a variety of explanations for the difference, sometimes completely opposite in the definitions of each. Probably the most consistent distinction is that stock comes from the cooking of a variety of ingredients including bones for non-vegetarian stocks, while broth is made with more meat. However, the bottom line is that the home cook can generally consider these terms interchangeably in any recipes. I will use broth in the rest of this post, just to keep things simple.

All Those Other Ingredients

Even though I have included a recipe here, with specific ingredients and amounts, the truly freeing part of homemade soups is the opportunity to be totally flexible. Unlike the more scientific world of baking, where even small differences in the amount of fat, leavening, flour, etc., can make or break a cake or muffin recipe, soups are where you can really get creative.

Let's use today's recipe for an example. This one includes carrot juice and a small amount of canned diced tomatoes. I have to admit that carrot juice is not typically in my pantry, but I found a great buy at Costco and tucked a couple of quarts into the freezer. A soup seemed an ideal time to use it, especially a soup where I might have otherwise added some sliced carrots. It turned out to be a good choice, but the soup ended up losing the bright color of the carrot slices; I happened to have the cup of tomatoes in the refrigerator, left over from an earlier soup of another kind, so that worked well to add a little color while not being a large enough amount to overwhelm with too "tomatoe-y" flavor.

I've added a suggested variation if you don't have carrot juice on hand, but that is only the start of variations you could make. And then you can keep going with your own variations. Maybe you are not crazy about celery, or only have one tired stalk left; reduce the amount or leave it out. I know that the broth I used had some poultry seasoning and sage in it so those flavors were already in the soup; you might want to add one of these--or maybe rosemary or some other herb--in addition to or in place of the herbs I used this time. And if you have some leftover vegetables in the refrigerator, maybe one or more of them might appeal to you in this soup too. But don't just dump every leftover into the soup just because it's there. Think first about the combinations. Asparagus is not going to work here, and as I mentioned, too much tomato would probably overwhelm the lovely mushroom/barley flavor combination. However, a cup or so of corn could  be a nice complement--and color brightener besides. Some chopped spinach or kale (kept in the freezer for just this kind of use) could also be a good addition.

I really do recommend this soup as a great way to enjoy mushrooms in a soup that even a lactose intolerant person could have. If you use a vegetable broth/stock as the base, it could even be a good choice for a vegan. (The butter is there because I find that just a little added to the mushrooms as they are sauteed adds great depth of flavor. That too could be left out for a vegan version.)

Barley Mushroom Soup

1 1/2 c hulled or pearl barley

5 to 6 c chicken or other broth

3-4 garlic cloves, minced

Olive or canola oil

2 T butter (optional)

1 large onion—about 2 cups—chopped

1 1/2 c diced celery

8 oz mushrooms, sliced (I used crimini or “baby bella”)

app 1 t each dried marjoram, basil, thyme, black pepper

2 c carrot juice

1 c canned diced tomatoes, with juice

1.  Cook the barley and garlic in the broth according for about  30 to 45  minutes, until just barely soft.

2.  While the barley is cooking, heat a small amount of oil in a large skillet over medium high heat. Brown the onions and celery slowly, stirring occasionally.

3.  When the onions become translucent and start to brown, add the butter if used and the sliced mushrooms. Continue sauteeing, stirring occasionally, until the mushrooms are well-cooked.

4.  Add the mushrooms to the cooked broccoli and stir in the remaining ingredients. Taste and adjust for seasonings. Continue to simmer for about 20 minutes or so to deepen flavors.

This soup is especially good the next day and can be frozen if desired. 

Serves 6 to 8.

 Variations:

Saute 2 to 3 cups of sliced carrots with the onions and celery and substitute added broth or water for the carrot juice. 

Substitute about a cup of cooked and pureed butternut squash for the carrot juice.

Add other vegetables or seasonings as desired. One to two cups of chopped frozen greens (spinach or kale) may be added in step 4. If still frozen, simmer for 30 minutes or so to be sure the flavors are well developed.

Substitute one to two 8 oz cans of mushrooms for the fresh mushrooms, including the liquid in the can. Do not saute with the onions; just add in step 4 directly from the cans.
You could even turn this into a Beef and Barley Mushroom Soup by adding leftover, diced, roast beef or steak, using beef broth instead of the chicken broth. Stir in the meat in step 4 and simmer for at least 20 minutes.