• $5 Dinners | Recipes, Meal Plans, Coupons

    Feeding the Family for $5 or Less

    Dinner Made Easy Freezer Party

    Mushroom Barley Soup

    by 43 Comments

    UPDATED with cooking time! Oops!!!
    mushrooms-marked-down

    When I saw mushrooms marked down at the store…I took advantage…and I made this soup!  That night.

    I found (and slightly modified) the recipe in the Smuckers Family Favorite Recipes booklet.

    mushroom-barley-soup

    Scrum-didli-umptious!

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    Mushroom Barley Soup

    Adapted from: Smuckers Family Favorite Recipes

    Yield – 4 servings

    Preparation Time – 5 minutes

    Cooking Time – 50 minutes

    Ingredients

    • 2 Tbsp butter or margarine (I used dairy free)($.20)
    • 1 small onion, chopped ($.20)
    • 2 carrot stalks, peeled and diced ($.20)
    • 2 garlic cloves, crushed ($.10)
    • About 8 oz. of mushrooms, chopped and sliced ($.99)
    • 2 cups water
    • 4 cups homemade chicken broth (free)(Substitute with vegetable broth for a vegetarian version!)
    • 1 cup pearled barley ($.50)
    • 2 tsp dried dill ($.25)
    • 2 tsp fresh parsley ($.25)(wishing I’d made this earlier in the year with parsley from the garden!)
    • Salt and pepper, to taste
    • Sister Schubert’s Dinner Rolls ($1) Used coupon when on sale!
    • Butter and Jam ($.25)

    **Throw in some leftover chicken or turkey into this soup!

    Directions

    • Add butter or margarine to large saucepan and let it melt.  Saute the chopped onions, diced carrots and garlic.  Once onions become opaque, add in the sliced and/or chopped mushrooms.  Saute for 2-3 minutes.

    chopped-mushrooms

    • Add water and broth and bring to a boil.  Add the pearled barley, dill, parsley, salt and pepper. (Add cooked chicken or turkey here if you wish!). Reduce heat so the soup cooks at a rolling boil.  Cook for 45 minutes, or until barley has cooked through.  (Note: I used pearled barley, not quick cooking barley.  Follow time directions on package if using quick cook barley!)
    • Warm rolls as directed on package and serve with butter and jam.
    • Serve Mushroom Barley Soup with Rolls and Jam.

    Cost $3.94

    See more $5 Dinners Popular Recipes here

    Comments

    2. this dinner is interesting to me – but i am curious – did your whole family eat it? including the kids? or did you feed them something different? my kids are 5,3,1 and don’t like barley . . ..

      if they didn’t eat this, what did you feed them?

      Reply

    4. I don’t think I’ve ever made anything at home using Barley. This might be a dumb question, but is the barley on the rice aisle at the store??? I’ve just purchased some Lentils last week and going to experiment with those next month. Thanks for widening out my taste buds 🙂

      Reply

    5. Erin,

      Unfortunately, my family would not eat this. My husband won’t come anywhere close to a mushroom. Anyway, I did want to let you know that I made your Apple-Cinnamon pancakes that you sent me the recipe to and we all 4 LOVED them! Thank you!!

      Reply

    10. I might have to try this recipe, I’ve never cooked barley or mushrooms before, although I do like them. I wonder if my hubby would eat this soup? We can always experiment and try it! Thanks for the recipe, it looks really good.

      Reply

    11. I am assuming that the celery, carrot, onion etc.you had in the fridge…BUT..after mentioning you could NOT resist buying them on sale, I fail to see them in your pic from Kroger shopping trip nor is the $.99 listed in the amount you spent……..HELLO….OPPS!!! Did you just forget??? Hmmmm…..

      Reply

    12. Just curious how fast this email will disappear…..where do you list the cost of $.99 for those bargain mushrooms??? They aren’t even in the picture. Can’t help but notice since you were so excited about getting a deal that you had to use them right away. Well????? That adds about a buck to your total…..did you happen to have anything else you forgot about like the onions and carrots and parsley?????

      Reply

    14. Hi. I am making this soup right now. I just added the barley, and the recipe doesn’t say how long to cook the soup after adding it. My bag of pearled barley says it takes 45 minutes to cook! Is there a “Quick Cooking Barley” that you used? I should have read the recipe more thorough, I guess. I would have started cooking dinner earlier. For some reason, I thought this was going to be a quick cooking soup. (My mistake…not yours!)

      Reply

    15. Question on the barely, Do make a much of this as well and store in the freezer. This is my first time working with Barely and am not sure on this.
      Thanks

      Reply

    16. Curious – She accounted for everything in the recipe above if you read the detail. She didn’t leave anything off. And if you add it up the dinner only comes to $3.94 so even if she used slighty more carrots and parsley than she thought she still comes in under $5. Sheesh. Give her a break. She’s providing you with a fabulous recipe that you can feed your family for less than $5. Don’t criticize. Be grateful.

      Grandma: Sometimes things get put in the refrigerator by helpful husbands before the picture can be taken. Forgetting one thing in a shopping trip isn’t a huge deal. I bet you would do the same thing on occassion.

      Reply

      • @Shellie,

        That’s why I hate taking shopping pictures! Something is surely to get missed because refrigerated stuff needs to be put away quickly!

        Looks like a great recipe! I have some mushrooms in the fridge, I will have to try this! Thanks Erin!

        Reply

    19. Made this for dinner last night. YUMMY. My husband and two of my three kids loved it. The youngest doesn’t eat much, so not a surprise that he didn’t make this! Will definitely make this again!

      Reply

    20. Erin – I’ve just started following your blog in the last month or so and this is the first recipe I’ve actually made of yours. WOW – this was awesome! My husband and I both loved it! My four year old only wanted the mushrooms so next time I may have to add double of those just for him!! Thanks so much for the great recipe!

      Reply

    21. Just finished dinner and this was YUMMY! No celery in your recipe but I added a few stalks. We also had mushrooms (organic) that were Manager’s Special from Kroger ($1.29 for 8oz)! Added some chicken that we boiled up earlier in the week (also Mgr’s Spcl). Also had biscuits that DH bought on Mgr’s Spcl w/ coupons. Skipped the parsley b/c we didn’t have any on-hand . . . maybe next time. Thanks for sharing the recipe – it was perfect for a rainy evening!

      Reply

    24. Hi, there!

      I’m a recent convert to your great meal ideas and am planning on making this delicious-looking soup for an adults-only Halloween party. Do you know how many servings, and of what quantity, this makes (so that I know by how much to multiply this recipe)? My apologies if I missed it somewhere.

      Can’t wait to try this!

      Reply

    30. I really enjoyed this! My boyfriend did as well. It made a lot of soup for relatively cheap. I did not cook the barley all the way because I liked it being a little bit chewy. Very delicious recipe!

      P.S. I added kale in for extra green

      Reply

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