Pressure Cooker Beef Barley Vegetable Soup

Submitted by TishT

"This is a cross between a soup and a stew, and is the perfect supper for midwinter warm-ups. Serve it with a salad or coleslaw and warm rolls with butter."

 

• Ready In: 35mins
• Ingredients: 15
• Serves: 6-8

ingredients

• 1 1⁄4 lbs lean ground beef
• 1 (28 ounce) can crushed tomatoes
• 2 1⁄2 cups water
• 1⁄2 cup barley
• 3 large carrots (about 8 oz. total)
• 2 stalks celery
• 1 large idaho potato (about 10 oz.)
• 1 medium onion (about 6 oz)
• 1 clove garlic
• 1⁄2 teaspoon dried basil
• 1⁄2 teaspoon dried thyme leaves
• 1⁄2 teaspoon dried rosemary
• 1⁄2 teaspoon dried marjoram
• 1⁄4 teaspoon salt
• fresh ground black pepper

directions

1. Brown the beef in the pressure cooker.
2. Drain off any fat.
3. Add the tomatoes, water and barley.
4. Close pressure cooker and bring up to full pressure.
5. Reduce heat to stabilize and cook for 10 minutes While the soup is cooking, split the carrots in half lengthwise, then cut into 1/2" thick slices.
6. Peel and dice the potato.
7. Dice the onion and mince the garlic.
8. When the soup has cooked for 10 minutes, realease pressure and add the vegetables, basil, thyme, rosemary, marjoram, salt and pepper to taste.
9. Close pressure cooker and bring up to full pressure.
10. Reduce the heat until pressure is stabilized and cook and cook 10 minutes longer.
11. Release the pressure.
12. The soup can be refrigerated for up to 4 days or frozen.

Reviews

[wayl0n]

I am a soup lover, and also a lover of my pressure cooker, but until now have not found a good soup recipe. This is one of the easiest, healthiest and heartiest soups I have had, the whole family loves it. When shopping the ingredients, we could only find quick barley. I was also scared because some past pressure cooker soup experiments have cooked some of the vegetables okay, but others were severely over-cooked. So just for fun, I tried browning the meat, then adding all remaining ingredients and bringing to pressure for 10min (vs bringing to pressure two different times), this was perfection! Everything was cooked perfectly, and the flavor was great. I did increase the water 1/2 c, and also added 1/2lb frozen cut green beans to the mix, then after removing from pressure, I will add 1/3lb frozen peas. Much thanks to the author, we make this a few times a week!

 

[cassiesmydog]

this is a great recipe! I made this today to share at work and everybody just loved it. It was so quick and easy to make. I will be making this often. Thanks for a great,quick and easy recipe.

 

[Amy F.]

Good recipe...my DH loved it! Easy to make especially with the pressure cooker..I only used 1 lb. of lean ground beef and I added a bit more salt and pepper. A great healthy recipe we will definitly make again. Thanks:)

 

[cbview]

This low star is mostly to balance out all the high marks, since the recipe does need some adjustments. The meat needs to be browned in some oil, otherwise it will stick terribly to your pot. The recipe as it stands is VERY tomatoey, and acidy. The barley was also too chewy on the times given, and the soup was too thick. We ended up diluting it out with a couple cups of bouillon broth, and added some sugar, and it was very good at that point. I would recommend halving the tomato, increasing the liquids with a cup of bouillon, and possibly adding sugar to break up the acid.

 

[barrdbarrbarr]

Very tasty - I used homemade beef stock instead of water, otherwise I followed the directions exactly. When it was done, I added more salt, and it was so thick that I actually added about 1.5 cups of homemade chicken stock that I had in the fridge. It was still more stew than soup :) I added some freshly grated parmesan for a garnish. Note to other Zaarers: Beware of the amount your pressure cooker can hold. I have a Cuisinart 6-qt electric pressure cooker, and this recipe was technically too much volume for it, but I managed.