I was searching for the perfect vegetable barley soup — one that was both hearty and chunky — and I found it… right in my own kitchen!

bowl of vegetable barley soup with bread

Last winter, I went on a mission to find the heartiest, chunkiest soup in town. And I eventually found it — in my own kitchen! Seriously, there was not one store that had the kind of soup I was looking for. I am not picky, but I wanted a soup that was both hearty and chunky. I found many delicious hearty soups… but they were all fully blended and creamy. The chunky soups out there were basically just water and vegetables. Then I realized that since soups are easy to make and can be very inexpensive, there was no reason why I should have to go searching for one in the store — especially since, even if I found what I was looking for, one cup would probably cost more than a whole pot of homemade soup.

So I developed this recipe…and I never looked back!

I love making soups because they are almost always foolproof. If you want, you can easily put a soup up in the crockpot in the morning and come home to a hearty, delicious, piping hot soup at the end of the day. If you’re making it on the stove top, you can prepare it earlier in the day or the night before and reheat it before supper.

You can make this vegetable barley soup a meal in a bowl by adding chicken or beef and serving it with some crusty bread, like my easy homemade bread. Also, don’t feel obligated to use the vegetables specified in the recipe. You can use any of your favorite vegetables — cauliflower, sweet potato, butternut squash, potato, mushrooms… I tend to use whatever is in my vegetable drawer.

You can also make this gluten free by swapping short grain brown rice for the barley.

Using a vegetable chopper makes vegetable soup prep go extremely fast. Funny story, over the years, I probably went through four or five vegetable choppers. Each time I tried one, it never seemed to work well and I would get rid of it, thinking something was wrong with it. But then I watched a TikTok post and realized that I was the problem! I was using the choppers wrong. I would always put the vegetables in and gently try to pull down the cover. But unless it was a very soft vegetable like a mushroom, they never seemed to go through the grates. After watching this post, I realized that if you bang the cover down with two fists, it works perfectly!

The Heartiest Chunky Vegetable Barley Soup

I was searching for the perfect vegetable barley soup — one that was both hearty and chunky — and I found it… right in my own kitchen!

Print Recipe

Ingredients

1 Tbsp oil
1 medium onion, diced
2 stalks celery, diced
1 medium zucchini, diced
1 medium yellow squash, diced
1 parsnip, peeled and diced
2 small carrots, peeled and diced
½ cup barley (or short-grain brown rice, for gluten-free option)
¼ cup red lentils (optional)
Salt and pepper, to taste
2 frozen dill cubes or a ¼ bunch fresh dill
6-8 cups water

Instructions

In a soup pot, heat oil over a medium flame. Add onion and sauté for about 5 minutes until translucent.
Add remaining vegetables and let them sweat for about 10 minutes, stirring frequently. Add barley, lentils (if using), dill, salt and pepper. Toast while stirring for about 2 minutes.
Add 6 cups water and bring to a boil over medium-high flame. Reduce flame to low, cover and simmer for 1-1½ hours, until barley is fully cooked, stirring occasionally. If soup seems too thick, add more water, about ½ cup at a time.

Notes

Make it a whole meal! Add a few pieces of chicken on the bone, chicken cutlets or beef stew meat to the soup. Shred chicken/meat (and remove bones, if applicable) before serving.
Blend this for a delicious cream of vegetable soup!
This recipe makes 6-8 servings, but it can easily be doubled or even tripled.