Recipe Monday: 5 Bean & Barley Soup & HBin5 Challenge

Yes, I know it’s Tuesday. That happens a lot around here.

In case you hadn’t heard, it’s been downright frigid around these parts for the last week or so – at least frigid for us! And unless you’re living south of the equator, it’s pretty darn frigid where you are, too, I’m betting. Time for some hearty 5 Bean Barley Soup! Want some? It’s easy-peasy!

5 Bean Barley Soup

Ingredients:

1/4 cup Great Northern or Navy beans
1/4 cup Roman (a/k/a Cranberry) beans
1/4 cup Small Red beans
1/4 cup lentils
1/4 cup split peas
1/4 cup pearl barley
1 medium onion, roughly chopped
2 large carrots, cut into 1 inch chunks
2 Tbs. canola or olive oil
4 cups broth of your choice (vegetable, chicken, or beef)
8 cups water
2 tsp. kosher salt (or more to taste)
1 tsp. ground black pepper

Optional: 1 large dried chipotle chili pepper or
2 tsp. Liquid Smoke

Preparation:

At least eight hours before cooking, rinse the beans, lentils, split peas, and barley and put them into a large bowl. Fill the bowl with cool water to cover by about 2 inches. Leave to soak overnight or for 10 – 12 hours. Drain, then rinse again.

In a 5 – 6 quart pot, sweat the onions and carrots in the oil over medium-high heat, till the onions are translucent, about 10 minutes. Add the beans/barley mixture, give it a stir, and add the broth, water, and seasonings. Raise the heat to high and bring to a boil, then cover partially (leave the pot lid a bit askew) and simmer on low for approximately 2-1/2 to 3 hours, till slightly thickened. Toward the end of the cooking time, taste the soup and adjust your seasonings – you may want to add a bit more salt and/or pepper – or even more Liquid Smoke.

Notes:

Stir occasionally during the cooking time to keep from scorching, and to scrape up any yummy bits that might have stuck to the bottom – they add flavor!

You can use whatever beans you happen to have, but keep in mind that cooking time varies according to the age and size of the dried beans you’re using.

Don’t have any broth handy? Use the equivalent amount of water and crumble in bouillon cubes or packaged dry soup mix!

Obviously, this makes a lot of soup – intentionally. The leftovers freeze beautifully – just thaw on your counter or in the microwave, add a little water or broth to thin it out a bit, and heat. There are two of us, and enough soup left over for 3 more meals! How’s that for delicious, satisfying, and budget-friendly?

Didn’t I tell you it was easy?

I’m serving mine here with pretzels I made from the Healthy Bread in 5 Minutes Whole Wheat Master Recipe.

To review, Michelle over at Big Black Dog, organized a new bread baking group, baking from the new book by Dr. Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe François, Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day. The current challenge is to bake 3 different things using the Whole Wheat Master Recipe: a loaf of bread, an epi (you’ll see), and crackers. Only I didn’t feel like making crackers, so I made pretzels!

It all started with the loaf:
I made a boule topped with sesame and flax seeds. Here are a couple of slices topped with my homemade Ruby Red Grapefruit Marmalade – my very first effort in canning! But that’s a story left for next week’s “Can Jam” post.

This is an epi:
Isn’t it cute? Okay, so very non-pro, but fun to make – you just form a thin baguette and snip it with kitchen shears! It was a lot of fun to eat, too, breaking off the “leaves” and dipping them in our soup! The epi came out very crispy and crunchy, and became the inspiration to make pretzels.

I made different sizes of pretzels – the smaller ones were made with balls of dough about the size of a ping pong ball, and the larger ones from dough balls about the size of a golf ball. I rolled them between my hands into long, thin snakes, twisted the ends a couple of times, and folded the twisted part over the loop of dough on my baking sheet. I misted the pretzels lightly with water and then sprinkled coarse sea salt on them, and baked in a 400º oven for about 20 minutes.

They came out golden brown and crunchy – and a perfect topping for my hearty soup!

Enjoy!