Beef and Barley Soup

This is a soup that I’ve only experienced from a can.  Nobody in my family ever made anything with “Barley” in it.  I wasn’t even sure what barley was until probably college… I knew it came in a can of vegetable beef soup, and that was about it.  But for some reason the other day I thought to myself… self… “i’m gonna make beef and barley soup, and I already know what i want in the broth!”  So, I set out throwing together ingredients, and I have to say I was pretty pleased with the results.  Best part? This all cooked in the crock pot while I was 2 hours away at a baseball game.  It’s about as low maintenance as you can get.  My husband doesn’t enjoy soup, so I often share what I make with my neighbors.  They gave it their official seal of approval, so here we go!

Ingredients

• 1 lb of cubed stew meat (beef)
• 1/2 of an onion, chopped finely
• 2 carrots, chopped
• 1 stalk of celery, chopped
• 1 cup sliced (fresh or canned) mushrooms
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp pepper
• 1 TBSP minced garlic
• 40 oz of beef broth
• 1 Tbsp Red Wine
• 1 TBSP Worcestershire sauce
• 3 Bay leaves
• 1 can of condensed french onion soup (i used campbells)
• 1/2 cup of uncooked pearl barley

Directions:

1. The first thing I did was take the stew meat, which is already cubed into about 1 inch cubes, and i cut the pieces into 4’s.  I wanted this soup to have lots of pieces of easy to chew beef, vs having big hunks of beef like a stew.
2. Once you’ve cut your beef, place it in the bottom of the crock pot, and throw everything else right in on top of it.
3. Stir the mixture around a couple times and then cook the whole thing for 8-10 hours on low.
4. Remove the bay leaves before serving.

Makes 9 (1 cup) servings= 185 Calories per serving

Appx 4 weight watchers points plus per serving

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