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| Hordeum — barley Photo courtesy USDA, via Wikipedia |
The new cookbook Jerusalem has been well received and has even landed in the bookshelves of Gwyneth Paltrow. I received it for my birthday and have made a handful of its Middle Eastern recipes already. The latest is the hot yoghurt and barley soup.
The barley and the water it is cooked in are enriched by sautéd onions, yoghurt, mint, parsley, and spring onions to make the soup. Further details shall be kept unrevealed for reasons of not spoiling the mystery (and, copyright).
Yesterday I made it the first time and left the barley too long; it was waterlogged and much of the cooking liquid had disappeared. The right response to this contingency was, as it proved, not to make up the difference with more water; that otherwise vitally important compound of hydrogen and oxygen was in the end the defining flavour of the broth. I tasted the soup toward the end of proceedings, then rushed in some 70 g of butter to thicken it; fortunately we were philistines and had wieners with it, so no one went unsatisfied. Today the grains were on the hearth for roughly twenty minutes' total, not even counting the simmering time, but they rested in the pot soaking up water while I prepared the rest of the recipe. This may not be ideal either, but everything retained its flavour and the barley's texture was quite nice.
As far as the garnish is concerned, I sautéed the spring onions until one or two bits were a little browned in the same pan (pot, but we'll pretend it was a better-suited pan) which had held the onions, so that the spring onions would be even more flavourful but gentle. It proved to be a good idea, though the pristine white-and-green contrast of the soup was further marred by this step.
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Jerusalem
by Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi
[Ebury Press]
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