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Mom's Italian Beef Barley Soup

"The best beef barley soup. Thickens with just the barley. Tastes best in the slow cooker. Serve topped with parmesan cheese and with a salad."

By allrecipes · From Open Recipes · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and barley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and 458 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

The recipe

6 servings
Prep10 min
Cook5 hr

Ingredients

Directions

Method written by CompKitchen from the ingredient list. Not the original author's method, not kitchen-tested.

  1. Place the cubed beef chuck, water, crumbled beef bouillon, chopped onion and tomato sauce in a large heavy pot. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, about 10 minutes.

  2. Reduce the heat to low, cover, and simmer gently for 4 hours, until the beef is tender and has reached at least 145°F (63°C) in the thickest pieces.

  3. Stir in the pearl barley, partly cover, and simmer on low for about 50 minutes, stirring now and then, until the barley is tender.

  4. Season with salt and pepper to taste, stir well, and simmer 2 to 3 more minutes so the seasoning blends in.

  5. Ladle into bowls and serve hot.

By allrecipes. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Beef + barleytop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together458 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  2. Beef + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together17,091 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Beef + tomatotop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together5,445 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Tomato + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together17,913 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Beef + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together18,971 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

Flavor stand-ins for the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, tomato, sauce, barley, pepper):

  1. Capsicumbetter flavor fit
  2. Potatobetter flavor fit
  3. Carrotbetter flavor fit
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, tomato, sauce, barley, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).