Name: Minestra D’Orzo alla Trentina (Trentino Barley Soup)
Yield: Serves 6
Cuisine: Italian
Ingredients: 30 ml/2 tbsp plain/all-purpose flour; 4 fresh marjoram sprigs, leaves chopped; 2 potatoes, peeled and chopped; 2.25 litres/4 pints/10 cups meat stock; 1 fresh rosemary sprig, leaves chopped; 1 meaty speck bone, or smoked ham bone; sea salt and ground black pepper; freshly grated Parmesan cheese, to serve; handful of fresh flat leaf parsley, leaves chopped; 4 fresh sage leaves, chopped; 1 or 2 celery sticks, chopped; 1 large onion, chopped; 30-45 ml/2-3 tbsp pork fat or olive oil; 1 large carrot, chopped; 200 g/7 oz pearl barley, rinsed

Preparation info

Serves
6

Difficulty
Easy

Appears in

The Italian Regional Cookbook

By Valentina Harris

Published 2017

About

This thick and creamy soup has lots of flavour with the added bonus of a meaty ham bone to make it really tasty and even more filling - perfect for a cold winter’s day. The meat should fall off the bone and become a part of the soup as it cooks. This is a traditional and old-fashioned soup in Trentino, where thrifty barley is used in all kinds of different dishes. A similar soup can be made using beans or lentils instead of barley. Pork fat is the most common cooking fat used in the region,