Name: Pearl Barley Salad
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 20 min
Total time: 30 min
Ingredients: 100 milliliters Pearl barley; 200 milliliters Water; 200 milliliters Water; 1 package Baby spinach ((broad-leaved) parsley or a salad mix with bitter greens); 1 Apple; Pomegranate seeds (from half a pomegranate.); 1/2 Cucumber; 2 Spring Onion; 2 sticks Rhubarb; 2 tablespoons White wine; Sugar (to taste); 1 teaspoon Powder Fort (See recipe notes)

One of my favourite salads is one based on boiled pearl barley. I love pearl barley salad, because it is filling, fresh and easy to make. I often serve it instead of pasta or potatoes and people generally seem pretty happy with that. More often than not, we have it with fish or a steak on the side but sometimes I serve it with some fried goats cheese on top instead of meat on the side. I do quite a few variations on this salad, but the boiled barley is at the core of each variation.

The pearl barley salad

I always have some greens in the salad, normally baby spinach, (broad-leaved) parsley or a salad mix with bitter greens. Some kind of fruit is always in the salad, often apples, but I have used peach and watermelon as well with great results. I like adding spring onions or radishes as well. Cucumber and bell peppers are also key ingredients. I tend to top the salad with nuts, pomegranate, dried fruit, feta cheese or bacon. The salad (not the topping) is tossed with a vinaigrette or serve it with feta, tzatziki or another yogurt dressing on the side.

The key to the salad is that everything is chopped fine and that the there is some kind of dressing for the salad or it can be quite dry and sad.

More ideas

Check the pictures for different suggestions to variations.

Barley salad with apples, bell peppers, broad-leaved parsley, spring onion and a bit of apple sirup and white wine as the vinaigrette

Pearl barley salad with baby spinach, mixed salad, apple and pomegranate. We were also making a rhubarb tart so we had a bit of rhubarb juices that I mixed with white wine to make a vinegaret. It was so yummy and the left overs will be my lunch today.

Another barley salad tonight. This time with goutweed from the summerhouse garden, as well as an apple, a cucumber and pomegranate seeds. Finished with a vingearet of redcurrant juice and the leaves salad burnet as garnish.

Yum, mum mum

Pearl barley, baby spinach, bell pepper and cucumber. I topped it with feta cheese instead of a dressing.

My Moroccan twist on the salad. Here the salad has pearl barley, parsley, cucumber and bell pepper and is topped with pomegranate seeds. On the side is a tzatziki and another yogut dressing. We had spiced meat balls and a tomato dish on the side.

This version was clean up the fridge salad. It had an oil based vigenette, peaches, water melon, parsley, bell peppers and radishes.

Pearl barley, apples, parsley, bell pepper and bacon topping, with feta on the side and a damper bread.

Here is a spring version with a sweet vinaigrette of rhubarb