When I
was recently back home in Scotland I went out quite a lot for lunch
and the one thing that I always love when I go out for lunch there,
is that the soups are always fantastic. Now to be honest there is no
excuses for bad soup, but the thing I love about the soups I had was
that they weren't fancy soups with exotic or indulgent ingredients,
they were the simplest soups you could imagine, using everyday
ingredients. They were the kind of soups that my Gran used to make
using good quality stock from the roast they had cooked on the Sunday
and using some of the left-over meat along with vegetables that were
in the fridge or pantry and sometimes a grain to help bulk it up and
turn it into a hearty, nourishing and completely delicious bowl of
soup.
This
is my version of a soup I had at a wonderful farm shop and restaurant
near to Perth. It is definitely a soup that needs a good stock so if
you don't have any homemade stock then use the best quality, good
tasting stock you can. It's a basic hearty soup so feel free to
change the vegetables around and use whatever you have available, and
for a vegetarian version simply miss out the chicken and use
vegetable stock instead.
150g
(¾ cup) pearl barley*
1 tbsp
olive oil
1
onion, chopped
1
leek, cleaned and sliced
2
stalks of celery, sliced
2
carrots, peeled & sliced
2
cloves of garlic, crushed
1
medium potato, peeled and cut into cubes
Salt &
pepper
Couple
of handfuls of cooked chicken, shredded or cut into small pieces
2 tbsp
parsley, finely chopped
Squeeze
of lemon juice to serve (optional)
Rinse
the barley well under water then put into a medium sized pan. Cover
with cold water, bring to a boil then leave to boil for 10 minutes.
While
the barley is boiling heat the oil in a large pan and saute the onion, leek and celery until softened but not coloured (roughly 5-7 minutes). Add
the garlic, carrots and potato and stir everything together and cook
for a couple of minutes until the barley is ready.
Drain
the barley then add to the vegetables along with 1.5 litres of the
stock. Season with salt and pepper and leave to simmer for 20-30
minutes or until the barley is cooked and tender. Taste to check the
seasoning and adjust if necessary then add the shredded chicken and
parsley. Cook for a further 2 minutes just until the chicken is
warmed through then if you like spritz with a little lemon juice.
Serve at once for a hearty and healthy soup that will warm you up in
an instant.
*Depending
on the type of pearl barley that you use, you might need to soak it
first so follow the instructions on the packet up until the last
20-30 minutes of cooking.
**If
the soup isn't all eaten straight away and is left to stand you will
need to add more stock to it as it will continue to thicken as the
barley soaks up the stock.
