Sarra Ina Garten’s beef and barley soup is a rich, hearty winter soup made with browned oxtails, leeks, carrots, celery, onion, fresh thyme, and pearled barley in beef broth. It serves 6 and simmers for about 1 hour 45 minutes.
Ina calls it Rich Beef Barley Soup in How Easy Is That? and says “when I’ve made beef barley soup in the past, it never had enough flavor.” Her fix is oxtails. They’re inexpensive, packed with collagen, and turn a basic broth into something thick and silky after an hour of simmering. She calls the result “such a satisfying first course or light supper.”
The barley cooks in a separate pot of water, not in the soup. If you cook barley directly in the broth, it absorbs most of the liquid and swells into a thick porridge instead of a soup. Cooking it separately and adding it at the end keeps the broth loose and the barley tender without stealing all the liquid.
Ina Garten Beef And Barley Soup Recipe
Course: SoupsCuisine: AmericanDifficulty: Easy6
servings15
minutes1
hour45
minutes380
kcalIna’s Rich Beef Barley Soup from How Easy Is That?, built on browned oxtails for a deeper, richer broth than regular stew meat gives you. The barley cooks separately so the soup stays a soup, not a porridge.
Ingredients
-
1 tablespoon good olive oil
-
2 lbs (900g) beef oxtails
-
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
-
2 cups (280g) chopped leeks, white and light green parts (2 leeks)
-
2 cups (260g) 1/2-inch diced carrots (4 carrots)
-
1 cup (150g) chopped yellow onion
-
1 cup (120g) 1/2-inch diced celery (2 stalks)
-
2 garlic cloves, minced
-
2 sprigs fresh thyme, tied with kitchen string
-
3 bay leaves
-
10 cups (2.4L) canned beef broth
-
1 cup (200g) pearled barley
Directions
-
Brown the oxtails: Heat the olive oil in a large pot or Dutch oven. Add the oxtails, 1 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper. Cook over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally, for 10 minutes until browned all over. Remove with a slotted spoon and set aside.
-
Cook the vegetables: Add the leeks, carrots, onion, celery, and garlic to the fat in the pot. Cook over medium heat, stirring now and then, for 10 minutes until the vegetables start to brown.
-
Simmer the soup: Add the thyme bundle and bay leaves. Return the oxtails to the pot. Pour in the beef broth, add 1 teaspoon salt and 1 teaspoon pepper. Bring to a boil, lower the heat, cover, and simmer for 1 hour. Discard the thyme and bay leaves. Skim off any fat from the surface.
-
Cook the barley separately: While the soup simmers, bring 4 cups of water to a boil in a separate saucepan. Add the barley, reduce the heat, and simmer uncovered for 30 minutes. Drain and set aside.
- Combine and finish: Add the drained barley to the soup and cook for another 15 to 20 minutes until the barley is tender. Taste for salt and pepper. Serve hot, with or without the oxtails in the bowl.
FAQs
Why does Ina use oxtails instead of stew meat?
Oxtails are loaded with collagen and marrow that melt into the broth as they simmer. After an hour, the broth turns silky and rich in a way that lean chuck or stew meat can’t match.
Ina says her old beef barley soups “never had enough flavor.” Oxtails were her fix. They’re inexpensive and do the same job as making your own bone broth, but in one pot with no extra steps.
Why cook the barley separately?
Barley absorbs a huge amount of liquid as it cooks. Drop it straight into the broth and it soaks up everything, leaving you with a thick porridge instead of a soup.
Cooking it in plain water for 30 minutes and draining it before adding it to the pot keeps the broth at the right consistency. The barley still picks up flavor from the soup in the final 15 to 20 minutes of simmering.
Can you make this soup ahead of time?
Yes, and it’s better the next day. The broth thickens slightly overnight and the barley absorbs more flavor as it sits.
Store it in the fridge for up to 4 days. The barley will continue to swell, so add a splash of beef broth when you reheat to loosen it back up. It freezes well for up to 3 months, but the barley gets softer after thawing.
Should you serve the oxtails in the soup?
Ina says to serve “with or without the oxtails.” The meat falls off the bone after an hour of simmering and is tender enough to eat.
If you leave them in, pull the meat off the bones and discard the bones and fat before serving. If you take them out, all that flavor is already in the broth. Either way works.
What can you use instead of oxtails?
Bone-in beef short ribs give you the same collagen-rich broth. Cut them into individual ribs and brown them the same way.
Boneless chuck works too, but cut it into 2-inch chunks and expect a thinner broth. You lose the gelatin that oxtails and short ribs give you, so the soup won’t have that same silky body. Add an extra hour of simmering to compensate.
