Farmhouse Vegetable and Barley Soup (Cook's Illustrated)

Most recipes for hearty winter vegetable soups, it turns out, are neither quick nor easy. For a satisfying soup that doesn’t take the better part of a day to make, we started with canned vegetable broth. To this we added soy sauce and ground dried porcini mushrooms. These ingredients added a savory, almost meaty flavor to the soup base. To make the soup more filling, we added barley to the hearty combination of carrots, potatoes, leeks, cabbage, and turnips.



We prefer an acidic, un-oaked white wine such as sauvignon blanc for this recipe. We love the richness added by the Lemon-Thyme Butter (related), but the soup can also be garnished with crisp bacon, crumbled cheddar cheese, or Herbed Croutons (related).