Mom's Italian Beef Barley Soup

It was easy to make turned out good. I did add diced carrots and potatoes and a little soy sauce with the diced canned tomatoes

I forgot to note, I wanted my soup a bit less thick, to soak into the bread I made, so I added an extra cup of water. I also browned beef stew meat before adding into the pot, following the suggestions of others. Yum!

Comfort food at its finest. You can jazz this up any way you like. I used beef broth and not the beef boullion because that is way too much sodium for me. I floured the beef and browned it in olive oil, then deglazed the pan with beef broth and scraped up all the fond to enrich the flavor. As you can tell by the picture, I like it thick so I added extra barley. I can see me making this on cold wintery nights. This is a keeper. Additional note: I've made this several times and this recipe is also good with sausage. I browned the sausage before adding it with the other ingredients.

I've made this several times already and kept meaning to leave a review. This is my husbands favorite soup and a big hit with my young boys as well. I usually double everything except the beef (I use ground beef) and that way I have tons of leftovers. The other reviewers are correct in that this does just get better with each day. I also add some carrots, celery and Italian Seasoning. It's a wonderful soup for a cold winter's day!

This was so good. I added potatoes, carrots, celery, parsley, concentrated beef stock and omitted the tomato sauce. The kids loved it. I loved it. I WILL make this again. It did thicken up quite a bit so today with the leftovers I will just add more broth. Excellent starter recipe.