Slow-Cooker Barley & Lentil Soup

The new year always brings an onslaught of “healthy eating” recipes. I suppose I’m not different as this soup is fairly healthy. Lentils and barley both provide a decent amount of fiber and carrots are good for you, right. I use a reduced sodium broth base and then add salt at the end via sriracha and/or a bit of Parmesan cheese.

As an aside, I like the concept of a slow cooker however in practice most of the recipes finish too quickly for them to be practical for me on a weeknight. When I work from home though I can take 10 minutes mid-morning, toss some ingredients together and then have dinner ready when I want to eat.

Caramelized Onion, Mushroom and Bacon Barley

This recipe has either a small amount of prep and a lot of cooking OR a large amount of prep and comes together real quick. Either way there is a lot of time in between cooking the components to do other things.

Caramelized Onion, Mushroom and Bacon Barley

As you can see, I made this in an electric skillet. Well, I baked the barley. I probably could have done the whole thing in the skillet though. Something to think about for another time.

Chunky Tomato Barley Soup with Chiptole

Oh the weather outside is frightful… came to mind last night after what was a rainy and dreary December day. Not really frightful but enough to push me into a soup frame of mind.

Chunky Tomato Barley Soup with Chipotle, Greek Yogurt and a dash of Paprika

This recipe is based on one from Nadia G’s Bitchin’ Kitchen on Cooking Channel. Same ingredients, slightly different prep order, good soup.