I cooked with barley for the first time this week and wow was I blown away. The recipe states; it is an old grain, the Irish equivalent to rice and is really nourishing. We never had it growing up and I haven’t come across it so far in recipes. It has a really earthy flavour and is not unlike risotto rice but with more depth of flavour.
I found the recipe using barley in a new cookbook I bought “the World of the Happy Pear” which I’m loving. The recipe is – “Hearty barley, leek and thyme stew” here’s a link. Yes, that’s right there is no meat in this recipe; the book is full of vegan recipes. I think the recipes are so tasty you don’t even miss the meat. My husband, on the other hand, does miss the meat, so I added a little to this recipe.
For this recipe, I halved the recipe to yield two portions. While I was making the stew, I put 170g of diced beef in a pot with 500ml of weak beef stock and added dried seaweed (there is seaweed in the recipe, and I was rehydrating the dried seaweed I had). I let this simmer gently for 1 hour while I made the rest of the stew. At the end, I added the beef and seaweed to the stew pot. I thought the addition of the beef might ruin the lovely flavours of the stew but it was still really flavoursome and didn’t take from the taste.
The recipe called for “pot barley” but I bought the processed type, “pearl barley” as I didn’t know the difference at the time. Next time I will try the pot barley as there is definitely going to be a next time, this recipe is going to be a staple of my dinner repertoire.
I’m ready for you winter.
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