Pearl Barley

 

 

I've always thought of pearl barley as a rather old fashioned ingredient.  Something that my mum would include in soups and casseroles.  Not very glamorous at all.  My views on this humble grain have recently changed.

In the last two days I have cooked three pearl barley based meals.  Yes, THREE!  There are a number of reasons that pearl barley has become flavour of the month at our place:

1.  It was on special at the supermarket (2 packs for $2.50)

2.  We are being frugavores this year, and healthy cheap meals are the order of the day

3. Autumn is here, and as the weather has been cooling down I have had a hankering for delicious soups, studded with pearl barley 'just like mum used to make' (not really my mum as she is a shocker of a cook!)

4  In my experiments with the grain, I soaked WAY to much barley and it was all plumped up and ready to go, and I really needed to cook it rather than waste it.

Anyway, I LOVE IT.  And so does the rest of the family (okay...the 4 year old still needs some convincing, but she is well on the way).

After doing quite a bit of reading up on how to best use my pearl barley, I decided I was most keen to make porridge out of it.  In the end I am so pleased that I did, because as I was preparing it I was reminded of my visits to my grandparent's farm and my grandfather making me porridge.  His porridge was never made of flat rolled oats.  Rather, plump and chewy grains.  I could never work out why it was different and oh-so-good, and now...25 years after the event (with grandpa long gone) I have solved the mystery.  My grandpa was no slouch on eating well ( 2 shots of wheat grass a day, whole grain porridge and brown bread, etc), he was also a raging fundamentalist Christian, but had toned it all down by the time I came along (thank god!).  

Back to my porridge.  I lovingly soaked my grains overnight, watching them closely, and frequently pinching them between my thumb and finger to feel how soft they were getting.  I had a bit of a look around for recipes, but eventually decided to make the porridge the way I usually do with soaked rolled oats.  Here's what I did:

Pearl Barley Porridge

Put one cup of soaked (at least overnight) pearl barley into a saucepan.

Slice up a banana and chuck it in too.

Pour in milk (or milk substitute) to cover the grains and banana

Add a good pinch of cinnamon (I used about a teaspoon, as I love it)

Drizzle in some maple syrup (about 2 teaspoons tops)

Turn on the heat and stir and mix until the banana is all melty and the pearl barley is cooked to your liking.  I didn't cook it for too long, as I liked the grains to maintain their shape and chewiness.  They were nutty and delicious.  The result was a scrummy little concoction, kind of like a dessert risotto.  I served it up with a dollop of yogurt.  YUM.

The quantities I have mentioned are fairly 'fluid' in terms of exactness...just go with your gut!

I have since cooked this twice more, and have frozen small portions of it for my baby to have at any time.  It has reheated well.  The addition of a bit more milk or yogurt loosens it up if it has thickened too much.

 SOUP!

The other dish I cooked was soup (of course).  But I hadn't been shopping for a while and was rather low on ingredients for soup.  I did a google search for the things I knew I had 'pearl barley, potatoes, silverbeet' and HEAPS of really good soup recipes came up!  The one I chose to loosely base my meal on also contained bacon, which I luckily had 4 pieces of beautiful free range goodness, in the fridge.

This soup is a super hearty, super delicious, and I suppose quite healthy meal (a bit of bacon never killed anyone, did it?!).  Here's how it goes:

Potato, Bacon, and Pearl Barley Soup

4 rashers of bacon, chopped up

 1 large onion, chopped

6 garlic cloves, finely chopped

around 2 cups of soaked pearl barley (more if you like)

around 300 grams of diced potatoes (I left the skin on)

2 packed cups of shredded silverbeet leaves - I have lots of this growing in my garden (save the stalks for a stir fry or something!)

2 bay leaves (I used fresh from the garden)

2 tablespoons thyme leaves (again, fresh from the garden)

About a litre of stock (I used chicken, as I had poached a chook last week with all kinds of yummy vegies and it made a beautiful, light and fragrant stock...mmm!). You may need to add more stock or water if the soup becomes too thick.

2 tablespoons of olive oil

Salt and pepper to taste

First I put the onions, garlic and bacon in a pot with a whack of olive oil and got it all nice and soft and aromatic.  Smelt amazing after only 5 minutes.

Then I added the potatoes, barley, bay leaves and thyme.  I covered the lot with the stock and let it simmer for around 45 minutes to an hour.  

After this time I checked the seasoning, and added a little salt to bring out the flavours.

When the potatoes were soft I switched off the heat and chucked in the silverbeet**.  After about 5 minutes I dished it up, served with a dollop of sour cream on top, and some freshly chopped silverbeet leaves.  This really made the dish.  It had that beautiful smokey flavour from the bacon, and then this creamy finish from the sour cream.  It was almost like a chowder.  The barley had lost some of it's shape, but was still chewy and yum. 

**Just to note:  The silverbeet does discolour if it is cooked for too long, so if you are doing this soup for guests, I would make the soup in advance, but not add the leaves until just before serving.  That way they are still vibrant and green.

I think that pearl barley is definitely making a come back in my kitchen.  Grandpa would be so proud.