Barley with meat can significantly diversify the diet, if you learn how to cook it correctly. The dish is hearty, healthy, but at the same time dietetic: after all, only this cereal has the ability to remove harmful cholesterol from the body. And pearl barley is an amazingly grateful ingredient that goes well with meat, vegetables and many other ingredients. The main thing is to learn to bring it to perfection.

Classic pearl barley porridge with meat

Imagine that you came to a restaurant, and you are offered to taste "pearl cereal with beef suvid." Agree, it sounds appetizing. But, when the dish is served, there will be no limit to surprise: you will be served the usual barley with stewed meat in a special way. Yes! Perlovka returns to haute cuisine, which means that soon you will be able to surprise your family and guests with haute couture dishes from our traditionally Russian, inexpensive pearl cereal. How to cook a classic barley with meat?

For cooking, we need:

  • pearl barley - 1 cup;
  • 500 gr of any meat (but it is better to take beef);
  • onions - 1 pc.;
  • carrots - 1 pc. (large);
  • bay leaf (optional);
  • salt, spices, pepper to taste.

It is better to rinse the barley in advance with cold water and leave it to soak all night - so we will prepare it, and it will boil many times faster. During the night, it will swell, it remains only to drain the water and set to cook. Pour groats with water at the rate of 1: 3, add salt, let the water boil, and then switch to a low fire so that it stomps. Readiness is determined quite simply: each grain is soft, but at the same time slightly “springy” inside. Usually, the time for cooking barley is 50-60 minutes.

You can speed up the process of cooking cereals at times, if after the first boil, drain the water, refill, let it boil and reduce the heat.

While the cereal is cooked, prepare the meat and vegetables. To do this, cut the beef into cubes, onions into half rings, and rub the carrots on a coarse grater. We heat the thick stewpan, add vegetable oil and a slice of butter, fry the meat and vegetables over high heat. Salt, pepper, add seasonings. Stew meat with vegetables until soft 60-90 minutes. If you saw that the meat is almost ready, it became soft, tender - it's time to combine it with boiled cereals.

At the last stage, mix the vegetable mixture, meat, cereals and simmer a little over low heat - 10-15 minutes. At the last moment, add bay leaf and turn off the stove: our dish should be saturated with the aroma of parsley, which goes well with pearl barley. But before serving, the sheet is always removed: otherwise the porridge begins to bitter.

Vary the amount of porridge, meat and vegetables so that the result is a juicy dish: if you go too far with pearl barley, the dish will turn out dry; although it’s easy to fix the situation by adding a little broth.

Barley with meat is ideally combined with dill, which can decorate the dish. It can be served with green radish, fresh carrot salad, cucumbers, mushrooms. Decorate the table in the Russian style, call the guests and discover a new taste of the good old barley.

Recipe for cooking in pots in the oven

Pots in themselves are table decorations. And the hostesses are well aware of how delicious, stewed, tender any cereal turns out in them. Barley is perhaps the best cereal for pots - there it opens up and quickly acquires the most necessary degree of readiness. And the meat from the pots is so tasty that it literally “jumps” from the fork into the mouth.

Preparing a meal is very simple:

  1. Lightly boil the cereal soaked the day before in a large amount of water.
  2. At the bottom of the pot, lay pieces of meat, fried onions, carrots and other vegetables to taste.
  3. We fall asleep with cereals so that 2-3 cm remain from the neck of the pot.
  4. Salt, add spices.
  5. Fill with water or broth almost to the very top (do not pour over - otherwise the dish will start to “run away”).
  6. We close the lids.
  7. We remove in the oven preheated to 200 degrees.
  8. Bake for 60 minutes.

Before serving, put a cube of butter in each pot. He will give the porridge the very creaminess, thanks to which it will play, it will become even tastier. You can sprinkle it with fresh dill or garnish with sprigs of parsley.

The best meat for baking in pots is pork neck; it turns out very juicy.

Porridge in pots is served with a salad of fresh radish, cucumbers, sauerkraut seasoned with aromatic vegetable oil.

Barley with meat in a slow cooker

A slow cooker is the very device that is famous for its ability to perfectly cook cereals. Many people equate the taste with the Russian stove: porridge is so successful in the cartoons. There is another big plus - for a multicooker you do not need to boil barley in advance. It is enough to rinse the cereal and leave it in the water while you are cutting vegetables and meat. Proportions take the same as in the basic recipe.

For cooking in a slow cooker, follow these recommendations:

  1. Rinse the barley with water
  2. Cut the meat into slices.
  3. Vegetables (carrots, onions) - cut into small strips.
  4. Fry meat and vegetables in the "Frying" mode until golden brown.
  5. Add the grits.
  6. Fill with water so that it is 2 fingers above the workpiece.
  7. Close the lid and simmer in porridge mode

Cooking time, the name of the mode depends on the technical capabilities of the multicooker.

The huge advantage of cooking in a slow cooker is the possibility, while the porridge is stewed with meat, to go for a walk, to do household chores, to devote time to a hobby. It’s extremely difficult to digest porridge, especially since the oven automatically switches the dishes to the “Heating” mode.And, of course, the “Delayed Start” mode is just as appropriate here: it’s easy to put the porridge overnight, and in the morning you can please yourself with a rich, fresh, aromatic breakfast.

With chicken and vegetables

Barley removes cholesterol from the body and contains few calories (100 g of boiled water contains only 109 kcal). With chicken, seasonal vegetables, porridge is easy for people who want to get in shape. To make porridge delicious, but at the same time dietary, a few tips will help. How to cook a low-calorie option?

Follow the instructions and prepare:

  1. In a saucepan, cook pearl barley porridge until half cooked.
  2. In a separate frying pan, we pass the vegetables and meat in a small amount of water mixed with 1 tbsp. vegetable oil.
  3. Mix cereals, vegetables, meat.
  4. Add a glass of vegetable broth or water.
  5. Stew until the croup melts.

For the dish, you can use eggplant, zucchini, pumpkin, any kind of cabbage, carrot, green peas - the more vegetables you add, the more interesting the taste. You can season everything with savory - it is very tasty with barley. Such porridge can be served with a sauce based on peppermint and natural yogurt, or eaten with a slice of yeast-free bread (or whole grain breads).

Royal recipe

Pearl barley in our country was opened with the light hand of Peter the Great: the tsar greatly respected this porridge, ate it on milk and loved it with mushrooms and meat. Royal pearl barley with meat can also become your signature dish: it successfully combines creaminess and piquancy, satiety, but at the same time lightness.

For cooking, we need not only cereals, vegetables, meat, but also pickled butter. You can take champignons, replace them with honey mushrooms, but it’s better to use butterfish anyway: and the smaller they are, the finer the royal porridge will turn out.

Cooking step by step:

  1. Pour the cereal with water and let it swell for 2-3 hours.
  2. Rinse it again with cold water.
  3. In the slow cooker, turn on the “Baking” mode and drown the butter on it (a slice weighing 50-60 g).
  4. Add onions, carrots, grated on a fine grater.
  5. Fry vegetables for 5 minutes, no more.
  6. Add chicken, cut from the thighs or legs.
  7. Stir and fry a little more until golden brown.
  8. Add the marinated butter and lightly fry everything together again.
  9. We fall asleep with cereal (it should increase in volume by about 2 times).
  10. Close the lid.
  11. Stew on the regime "Porridge" (or "Buckwheat", someone like).
  12. Serve with fresh herbs.

It is appropriate to add a cube of mushroom broth to porridge: this way the taste of mushrooms will be even more pronounced.

The indicated amount will be enough for 6 large servings, that is, it is easy to invite a company of hungry adults to the royal porridge, and they will leave full. You can drink porridge with cool kvass, or any sour-milk product.

With beef and beans in Transcarpathian style

In Transcarpathia there is a national dish of barley and smoked meat, which is called chovlent. It is necessarily prepared in pots, and not only barley and meat, but also beans and smoked foods act as ingredients. In addition to beef, you can use pieces of smoked chicken, pork ribs, even chicken necks - the more varieties are used, the tastier the dish will turn out.

It is very simple to cook it, if you take as a basis a recipe for meat with barley in pots. In the same way, fry meat with vegetables, put in pots, fill the base with pearl barley. Although there is an important nuance: in the original recipe, the beans are boiled until tender, and then put in pots. But it is easy to simplify the process if you buy a jar of any beans: white, red, in your own juice or tomato. In this case, the liquid can not be poured out, and also added to the dish.

The dish is served with sour cream, lots of herbs, fresh cakes, and washed down with dairy products.

Barley soup with meat

At the mention of "pearl" cereal, you can not ignore the soup with this cereal - hot first courses with barley go rich, hearty, and so appropriate in the winter season.It’s clear that everyone knows how to cook a traditional pickle, but few people know: even a simple pearl barley meat soup is very tasty, and quite tireless in cooking.

Cooking a “pearl” soup is very simple:

  1. Boil the beef brisket meat broth (60 to 90 minutes).
  2. While the base for the soup is boiling, soak the pearl barley so that it swells.
  3. We pass the carrots and onions in butter.
  4. Once the meat is soft, take it out of the pan.
  5. We lay cereals and vegetables.
  6. We cook all 60 minutes until the cereals are ready on low heat.
  7. Add the meat, sliced ​​into pieces.
  8. Put the bay leaf.

For soup in a 3 liter pan, 100 g of cereal is enough - otherwise the soup will turn out too thick.

Before serving, sprinkle each plate with herbs, you can season with a teaspoon of sour cream. If you notice, there are no potatoes in the soup. But, if desired, you can add a couple of tubers whole there: it will break apart, giving the soup a special density and richness.

Perlovka is a fine cereal. It perfectly saturates without adding extra calories. Given its "cheap" price, you can cook it at least once a week, each time opening new options. But make sure that the cereal is clean, does not contain a lot of garbage, which is quite difficult to clean. Be full and happy!

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