pearl barley recipes

May 19, 2014 9:35 PM

I accidentally cooked pearl barley instead of brown rice in the rice cooker. What can I do with three cups of cooked barley?
posted by wilful to Food & Drink (10 answers total)

Ask Metafilter on best barley recipes
posted by aniola at 9:49 PM on May 19, 2014

Add it to soups at the end of the cooking time. Turn it into a tabbouleh-like salad with chopped-up tomato and parsley (or mint). Add a tin of chickpeas, maybe two, some toasted pinenuts, a glug of olive oil, juice of a lemon and maybe the zest too, some fresh thyme and some nice soft goat cheese (will be enough for several meals).

Or just do whatever you were going to do with the brown rice, just have barley instead.
posted by Athanassiel at 9:50 PM on May 19, 2014

I adore barley. There's something about it that I find even more soothing and flavor-adaptible than rice. My favorite thing is a salad with cooked barley, corn off the cob, sliced radishes, avocado, tomato, chopped cilantro and a good lemony/limey vinaigrette. I ring changes on this all summer long. IT'S. SO. GOOD.
posted by ottereroticist at 10:28 PM on May 19, 2014

Here are the recipes from Alton Brown's "Just Barley" episode of Good Eats (it'll cost you USD$2 to see it). I'm not sure if you can make Barley Water, but since your barley was steamed, in essence, not steeped, well, maybe it's still on the table. Barley Bread calls for barley flour, but the other dishes you can still make. The barley salad looks perfect, and delicious; the barley and lamb stew looks slap-your-grandma good!
posted by Sunburnt at 10:30 PM on May 19, 2014

Frankly, I think almost any grain aside from rice tastes good in the morning with maple syrup on it. For some reason I can't wrap my mind around maple-y rice porridge but I'd hit that barley, baby.
posted by Foam Pants at 11:36 PM on May 19, 2014

I typically mix my brown rice 50/50 with barley anyway, so ditto to "...just do whatever you were going to do with the brown rice..." Rice & beans, mix with tabbouleh salad, rice porridge, etc.
posted by Jack Karaoke at 12:02 AM on May 20, 2014

Beef, mushroom and barley soup is one of my favorite things in the world.
posted by Faint of Butt at 3:17 AM on May 20, 2014

Make a salad - stir some pesto through it, add rocket (arugula), marinated artichokes, feta, maybe a bit of chorizo. Yum.
posted by escapepod at 4:09 AM on May 20, 2014

We had a very delicious brussels sprout barley dish with gorgonzola and pecans last night.
posted by crush-onastick at 6:23 AM on May 20, 2014

Barley is bomb and I'd use it in any dish instead of brown rice in a heartbeat.
posted by Lynsey at 11:08 AM on May 20, 2014