Barley is a great source of soluble fibre which helps carry cholesterol through the gut to the outside world. The added vegetables add plant sterols. If you want additional plant sterols, add a cup of diced zucchini.
This soup can be made with beef stock or may use pre-cooked beef. The beef adds a distinctive flavour, but you can add less beef to the soup if you are worried about residual animal fat. The steps we take remove most of the fat, but a little probably remains.
Beef stock
This is made with beef soup bones and roasted vegetables.
Place beef bones on a roasting tray along with 2 carrots, an onion halved, 2 celery stalks, several cloves of garlic. There is no need to peel the veg. or remove the onion and garlic skins: these add to the flavour. Bake in an oven 1 - 1 1/2 hours at 325 F 180 C. The bones and veg. should be browned by the end of this time.
Place the bones and vegetables in a large pot. Cover with 2 quarts water. Bring to a boil. Simmer 1 hour.
Drain the broth. Let the bones cool and remove any lean meat left on the bones. Dice this meat.
Discard the bones and veg. Cool the broth in a fridge. Remove any fat that solidifies during cooling.
Pre- cooked beef.
About 1 lb. beef left over from a roast can be used, or left over braising steak etc. Cut in small pieces and remove any visible fat. Put in large pot and cover with 2 quarts water. Simmer 1 hour. Cool in refrigerator and remove any fat that solidifies during cooling.
In the large soup pot sautee 1 diced onion, 6 cloves of garlic chopped, 2 carrots diced small, 2 stalks celery sliced thin.
When the onion is cooked to slightly browned but not burned (this adds additional flavour and colour to the soup) add the beef stock or the pre-cooked beef and its stock.
Add 1 cup barley. Barley swells significantly when boiled. It also has a coating of barley powder which thickens the soup. Simmer for about an hour. The soup will be quite thick.
This soup is good seasoned just with salt and pepper, but Italians like it with Italian seasoning added or it can be made spicy with paprika for Poles and Hungarians: it is a peasant soup and benefits from any such seasoning.