1 cup pearl barley

3 cups water

Put in kettle with lid, simmer 20 min

Stir once

Add tiny baby gold potatoes, on top of the barley.

Cover and simmer 25 minutes.

Should be soft and fluffy grains, like cooked rice. Not a mushy paste.

Season to taste* and serve.

Optional: add small carrot or apple pieces during last 10 minutes. (If using apple, use a firm baking type apple that wont go mushy.)

*footnote: I’m avoiding salt these days and this is fine without salt. If you are the sort who salts your rice or oatmeal, feel free to add salt or tamari sauce to taste. Onion powder pepper and/or garlic powder would also work. Gravy is nice.

With apples, I prefer butter, cinnamon and brown sugar (no onion, no garlic, etc)

Early Spring Stew: Lamb, Mushroom & Barley with Roasted Roots

1. Preheat oven to 400F with cast iron skillet inside.

2. In 2 quart saucepan on stovetop, set to boil 1 cup pearl barley with 1.75 cups chicken stock or water AND ¼ cup soy sauce or tamari. Add 2 tablespoons onion powder or dried onion flakes, and a big handful of chopped mushrooms. Put lid on, reduce to simmer. Set timer 40 minutes.

3. Meanwhile, wash, peel, slice mushrooms, red onions, carrots, parsnips, yukon gold potatoes, turnips, and/or radishes. Either put in microwave on “fresh vegetable” setting, or steam until crisp tender. Except the onions. Don’t cook those, yet.

4. Now that skillet is hot, put lamb stew chunks into pan and roast until they look like well seared steaks. Both sides. (Reduce heat to 375F if there is too much smoke.)Season, if desired.

Remove from pan, set aside.

5. Add partially cooked veggies and the raw onions to the fat in the pan (add cooking oil if needed), toss to coat, and roast until carmelized. Add salt to taste, a tablespoon of crushed fresh garlic, a hefty grind of black pepper, and a tablespoon or two of dried onion flakes or onion powder.

6. Deglaze the pan with a little wine, water or broth, then add the cooked barley and meat to the pan. Stir to combine.

Serve as is, or simmer a while longer if you prefer. If it seems too dry, add more water or broth. This is a stew that will taste even richer on the second day.

Serve with good bread, and some early spring greens.

Does barley/wheat dough make good soft pretzels?

Yes. Yes it does!

(I was worried because barley doesn’t stretch like wheat, but if you knead and roll this dough in a handful of wheat flour, it will indeed make ropes.)

Dough:

1 cup wheat flour

1 cup barley flour

1 cup water

1 tsp yeast

1 tsp salt

Mix together, knead in wheat flour until manageable. Shape, rest, boil, bake.

(For the boil: mix 2 TBS baking soda into 2 cups water, boil, reduce to simmer, add pretzel, 30 seconds, flip, simmer 30 seconds, drain, blot dry, put in hot pan lightly dusted with meal or crumbs, then bake in hot oven.)

Want to add malt next time!

Good soup deserves good bread

1 cup wheat flour

1 cup barley flour

1 cup water

1 tsp yeast

1 tsp salt

¼ tsp baking powder

Mix all the ingredients together.

Shape into a ball.

Dust baking pan with barley meal or corn meal, put the ball of dough on it.

Leave it sit several hours. Somewhere between 5 and 10. Go do something else for a while.

Bake in 375F oven until interior temp is 197F.

I used a cloche on mine for the first 5 minutes to get the crust, but this is not strictly necessary.

I couldn’t find barley flour, so I threw some pearl barley in the blender. Sifted it and had nice flour, and enough leftover grit to dust the tray so it wouldn’t stick.

A hearty bread that makes me feel satisfied a good long while. A small loaf goes further than the same amount of wheat bread. Soft crumbly interior texture. Beautiful flavor.

Very good dunked in soup, or dipped in a small dish of balsamic vinegar and salt. Also pairs well with sharp white cheddar and tart apples.

Inspired by these:

Things I learned this time around:

Time spent picking out colors and setting up the warp is time well spent.

For the edges, I like a 4 same threads, or 2 and 2 pattern, but I don’t like the three blue and one violet threading– the interval between the pops of violet are too long.

The color of the weft only shows at the center of the x reverse and the edges. I like it when the weft matches the edges.

Snapped warp threads are a pain. Use strong enough threads.

I tried varying the weight of the threads in a few cards, and it wasnt worth the effort. Or needs to be varied by a lot more.

Lanyards are best with a doublefaced pattern.

Made it through the first 2 reverses, and discovered butterflies in the pattern

This is a variation on the Oseberg pattern, for those wondering. I just mirror imaged it and offset the two sides by one stitch. I got the original pattern from this wonderful site:

Barley