Comforting Beef Barley Soup (Instant Pot)
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A simple beef barley soup made in the instant pot (pressure cooker). The beef is tender, veggies are perfectly cooked, and the barley is al-dente. It’s seriously the simplest, most delicious soup. And it’s healthy too!
Feeling all the fall feels with the coziest, warm beef barley soup.
And yes, technically we’re still a few days away from the actual fall season. But are we really counting? I’m totally already there. Bring on the fuzzy socks, the oversized sweaters, the extra hot pumpkin spice lattes, and large, overflowing bowls of cozy soup and let me enjoy all my fall favorites for the rest of the year. ❤️
This is fall comfort food done right. Because i’m not just talking about any old boring beef barley soup. I’m talk about the kind of soup that hits all the perfect warm and cozy notes with spoonfuls of flavorful broth, tender beef, lots of veggies, and al-dente barley. It’ll stick to your ribs, give your insides a big hug, and leave your belly extra happy.
SERIOUSLY THOUGH.
There isn’t a single thing I don’t love about food like dis. ??????
If I haven’t said it enough, let me say it again for the umpteenth time — fall is my most favoritest season EVER. Mainly because the world turns beautiful hues of reds, oranges and yellow. But also because it’s officially time for everyone to get out there slow cookers for — SOUP SEASON. Which means gimme all the veggies// fiber-full grains// beans// legumes// protein and let me make you a big pot of slow cooked, rustic style soup.
What makes this soup recipe 1000x times better is that we’re making it in the instant pot so really you’re getting a soup that tastes like it’s been slow-simmered all day long without actually cooking it for a million hours. And yes, you sure can cook this recipe all day long if you really want to but do you really want to? My instant pot is seriously my new bff.
During Amazon Prime Day this year they had a deal on the Instant Pot that was just too good for anyone to pass up. It took me 3 whole seconds to decide that yes indeed, I did need another kitchen gadget and to hit the BUY NOW button. Slow cooker, pressure cooker, steamer, yogurt maker all-in-one. What? Do I actually need a yogurt maker? Heck no. Can I say I have one when the zombie apocalypse hits? Oh yeah.
To no ones surprise, the box sat in the laundry room unopened until a week ago when I went it to reorganize a bit. And there, still in it’s original box was the instant pot. And since [re]discovering it i’ve cooked most of our meals in this little gadget.
I’m obsessed.
It all starts with browning the meat — yup, right in the instant pot. Cleaning just a single cooking vessel has never been so satisfying. Though the browning is optional, I highly suggest it as it really makes a better soup. Once the meat is done, we’re going to brown mushrooms too. Because we know that this helps pick up all the little brown bits the meat left behind and it generously gives the mushrooms a little boost in the flavor department. Now add the onions, celery and carrots and let them sweat a bit. Relax, let the instant pot do it’s thing. They’ll pick up all the flavors left behind in the pot from the beef and the mushroom. We’re building flavors here. One ingredient at a time.
And when the veggies have softened a bit, we add the beef, mushroom, a little bit of thyme, and a couple of bay leaves along with the beef broth. If you’ve got a pressure cooker//instant pot, this will take just 15 minutes to soften the stew meat all the way through, if you’re doing this in the slow cooker let it hang out and cook on high for 3 hours or on low for a good 6.
And just before you’re ready to eat, add the shredded potatoes and rinsed pearl barley and let it cook for another hour on the high setting. The smells. ♨️♨️ Tender chunks of beef, warm broth scented with garlic, onions, and thyme. It’ll make the whole house smell like fall.
And before you sit down with a bowl of beef barley soup don’t forget to get out the loaf of crusty bread that you’ve reheated in the oven or better yet make your own because what is soup without bread to dip and sop up all that flavorful beef broth?
And when you’re contemplating whether or not you really need a second bowl, don’t think. Grab the laddle and be generous to yourself.
You deserve it.
PS – Up until recently, I’ve always used diced potatoes in my beef barley soup but the shredded potatoes is a little trick I picked up from The Food Charlatan and it’s seriously the best thing in this soup!
PPS – I highly, highly recommend the instant pot for you/the cook in your life (hello early christmas present!) I’m lovin’ it and am definitely planning on sharing more instant pot recipes in the near future!
Comforting Beef Barley Soup (Instant Pot)
A simple beef barley soup made in the instant pot (pressure cooker). The beef is tender, veggies are perfectly cooked, and the barley is al-dente. It's seriously the simplest, most delicious soup. And it's healthy too!
Ingredients
- 1 ½ pounds stew meat
- salt and pepper
- 2 tablespoons oil
- 10 baby bella mushrooms, quartered
- 3 cups mirepoix (just a combination of chopped onion, celery, and carrots)
- 6-8 cloves garlic, minced
- 6 cups low sodium beef broth (or vegetable)
- 1 cup water
- 2 bay leaves
- ½ teaspoon dried thyme
- 1 large potato, shredded (using a food processor or grater)
- 2/3 cup pearl barley, rinsed
Instructions
- Season the stew meat with a good pinch of salt and pepper. Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in a large pot or in the instant pot over medium-high heat. Add ½ the stew meat and brown on all sides for about 2-3 minutes total. Remove meat to a plate and repeat with the second batch and the second tablespoon of oil.
- Add the mushroom to the pot and brown the mushrooms for 1-2 minutes or until they start picking up the brown bits left behind by the meat. Remove the mushrooms to the same plate as the stew meat.
- If needed, add a little more oil to the pot and the mirepoix mix. Cook the veggies for 4-5 minutes or until the onions soften and become translucent. Add the garlic and cook for an additional 30 seconds.
- SLOW COOKER: Add the softened veggies, stew meat, mushrooms, bay leaves, dried thyme, water, and beef broth to the slow cooker and allow the soup to cook on the high setting for 3 hours or on the low setting for 6 hours.
- INSTANT POT: Add the stew meat, mushrooms, bay leaves, dried thyme, water, and beef broth the to sautéed veggies in the instant pot, cover and pressure cook the meat for 13-16 minutes depending on the size of the stew meat. Allow the pressure to release before removing the lid.
- BOTH METHODS: Add the shredded potatoes and the barley and allow the soup to cook on the high setting (for the instant pot you hit the slow cook button) for 1 hour or until the potatoes and barley cook through. Season with additional seasonings to taste. Serve warm with chopped parsley on top and a loaf of crusty bread or crackers.
Notes
- Sometimes I like to spice things up by adding a little pinch of red pepper flakes along with the dried thyme too but this is purely optional.
IS THIS A GOOD CHOICE FOR YOU?
Nutritional content based on 8 servings.
if you like this recipe, you might also like:
Winter Lemon Chicken Barley Soup
instant pot chicken wild rice soup
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84 Comments on “Comforting Beef Barley Soup (Instant Pot)”
Made just as directed but didn’t have mushrooms or potatoes. instead I put 1/2 peas and finely diced cauliflower in with the pearl barley. The texture of the barley was perfect. I also “cheated” with roasted garlic in a jar. I’m new to the instant pot world and was very pleased with the results using 15 min on my “soup setting” then nat. release for 15 and pressed the valve to let the rest of the steam escape before putting it on “slow cook.” Thank you for the excellent instructions!
This is a great recipe! I cut a ton of corners, bc of time, and doubled the recipe. I sauteed the meat all at once, at the same time, sauteed onions, carrots, celery and garlic in a separate pan. Stirred veggies, no potatoes tho, in with meat and added the rest of the ingredients and pressure cooked for 40 min. (that may have been too long) and released the pressure immediately. I also sauteed the mushrooms separately because we prefer them that way. It turned out fabulous!!
Made this today as written except I used 7 cups of homemade beef stock. It’s also the first time I’ve ever cooked with barley and thanks to this recipe, it won’t be the last. Thank you!
I so much LIKE-LIKE barley! Beef barley soup is my forever favorite of the beef-type soups, and I’m looking forward to making your recipe. I ordered an IP off Amazon three weeks ago, but due to a huge project I’m doing for my minister, with a tight deadline, I haven’t even taken the pot out of the shipping box yet. I think, just to get over the hump of nervousness of cooking with a pressure cooker for the first time, I’ll start with boiled eggs–I don’t have a kitchen, so can’t make boiled eggs right now, but I understand the IP does a great job of turning out seriously good ones–and then I’ll progress to the soup. I don’t care what time of year it is, soup is always the best comfort food there is, and I eat it, hot days, cold days, rainy or sunny days–I really, really like good soup!!
I made this recipe in my instant pot. I also cooked it at high P for 40 min instead of 30 and I added frozen peas at the end. i really enjoyed this soup! It’s more flavourful than some other beef barley recipes and I attribute that to the tomato paste and extra carrots. I did however feel that the amount of thyme was a bit overpowering if the other flavours but possibly because I didn’t use the recommended rosemary as I was all out. I’ll definitely make this again and would highly recommend it to others 🙂
We loved this recipe! I followed all of the instructions foe the instant pot, but put in cubed potatoes and the barley at the same time, and just upped the time for a few minutes. We also added more thyme, cayenne pepper, S&P. Delicious!
This looks amazing and I can’t wait to eat it. Surprisingly my VERY picky 14 month old tends to like things based in beef broth so I can’t wait to try it. I’m not very familiar with switching out grains, especially in the Instant Pot. Do you think Farro would be an acceptable sub for the barley in this recipe with the same cooking instructions? Thank you!
I haven’t tried it with Farro before, but I think it could work! It’ll probably take just as long as the barley, or maybe an extra 10-15 minutes!
Farro can be directly substituted for the barley. I actually prefer it that way.
Aaamazing so friggin good. Am making it again! Family loved it. Went real fast. Wouldnt change a thing.
The wonderfully inviting way this recipe was presented begged me to try it and boy’o I’m so happy that I did! I think it’s the best soup recipe I’ve had since getting an instapot and I strongly recommend you get to it and make some for yourself because you can’t have any of mine! Seriously though, everything about this is great. I followed the recipe and it yielded fantastically delicious soup as promised.
Excellent! I’v Been making Beef Barley soup for years. This recipe sped up the process and produced a most flavorful soup – hubby loved it! Making it again this weekend to have with friends while we watch the Hockey All Star gam
Very nice recipe. I used my leftover Prime Rib bones to make bone broth yesterday. I cut up all the leftover Prime Rib today. Sauteed the vegis as directed in the IP then added ALL the ingredients and cooked for 13 minutes in the IP on the soup setting. Quick release and we were in business, I did add about 1/2 teaspoon of Trader Joes Salute seasoning to jazz it up after it finished but a terrific recipe that was easy to adapt with my leftover roast.
I made this last night with leftover prime rib roast we had on hand. I didn’t want to wait the hour for the barley so I put it in with the soup and cooked mine on the soup setting for 13 minutes with a quick release and it turned out perfect! I also skipped the potatoes.