Homemade Chicken Barley Soup

Make a batch of this delicious healthy chicken barley soup for the week. It’s truly something you’ll be looking forward to when it starts getting cold outside. So warming, so comforting, so good. You’ll love this recipe for homemade chicken soup with barley, because it’s easy, healthy and super tasty.

Everybody loves Homemade Chicken Soup

There’s nothing like homemade chicken soup. It’s healing, it tastes good and it warms you up when you need it. Did you know chicken soup is actually scientifically proven to be good for you? Especially when you have an upper respiratory tract infection. I know, I guess it’s not just for your soul!

Chicken soup is one of my favorite meals to enjoy during fall and winter, ever since I was a kid. I loved to add a big punch of freshly ground black pepper, and that since I was probably 10. It is one of my forever favorite meals and it never disappoints.

These past few months I found it is actually a great soup to enjoy during summer as well. I got sick and the only thing I wanted to eat for a while was this chicken soup with barley. It was boiling hot outside. It did not stop me. That homemade soup always seems to find its way to my heart and belly. (fine the other thing I couldn’t get enough of was tzatziki…I needed it on everything!)

And the addition of barley was such a good decision! Barley makes the chicken soup thicker, more nutritious and more filling. I find it actually tastes much better than what I’d usually choose which is rice.

Barley Chicken Soup Ingredients

• Barley. You can also use another grain you have and love. Barley has some gluten in it and if you’re gluten intolerant you might want to skip it and add rice or quinoa. Another option would be coarse bulgur, but it’s also a grain that has gluten in it.
• Chicken Thighs. Boneless, skinless chicken thighs will make up the chicken part for the soup. You can also use chicken breast, but I always find chicken thighs better. Using boneless and skinless chicken really speeds up the process, since it cooks faster than bone-in chciken thighs.
• Dried Mint. Mint is my favorite herb/spice to use in soups! It’s hard to describe the taste – you really need to try it. If you don’t like mint, you can also use basil or dried parsley.
• Soup Vegetables. I used the classic soup vegetables – onion, potatoes, carrot and added some butternut squash, because I had a lot of it at home. Feel free to swap it for whatever you have!
• Water or Stock. Since I’m allergic to many ready-to-use products like stock or broth I always just add water and let the broth make itself while the soup is cooking. However, if you have some soup stock and love it, feel free to use it instead of the water. If you do use water, make sure to add a good pinch of salt to it – otherwise, the soup will turn out bland.
• Noodles (optional). I used some gluten-free noodles because I was making this batch of soup for a bunch of people, including kids and they love their noodles. Otherwise, I make it without.
• Parsley and black pepper. My favorite way to top chicken soup!

How To Make Chicken Barley Soup

Making this healthy chicken soup with barley is not a difficult task. All you need to do is boil the chicken and then add the other ingredients! Here are the steps:

• Boil the chicken thighs with water to cover and a good pinch of salt for about 20 minutes.
• In the meantime, grate the potatoes, carrot, butternut squash and chop thinly the onion.
• Once the chicken is tender, take it out (I “fished” it out with a big fork), place onto a flat plate or a board.
• Before you start shredding the chicken, add barley, chopped onion, the shredded potatoes, butternut squash and carrot, as well as mint to the cooking pot. Add some water if needed (I added one more cup).
• Then use two forks to shred the chicken into pieces. To do this, you hold the chicken with one fork and pull with the other. It’s super easy!
• Add the shredded chicken back to the cooking pot and cook at low to medium heat for 30-40 more minutes, adding water and salt if needed.
• Serve immediately with chopped parsley and freshly ground black pepper!

How To Store

This soup stores really well in an airtight container in the fridge. It will stay good for about 5 days.

You can probably also freeze the soup, but I haven’t tried it yet!

Why Is This Homemade Chicken Soup Healthy?

Barley seems to be one of the grains I can tolerate just fine and I found out it’s an amazing addition to chicken soup.It’s low in gluten, it’s a prebiotic (great for gut health), and has a low glycemic index too. I guess we found a winner!

Barley soup and chicken soup were actually also tested as part of a meal plan in Iran to ease COVID-19 symptoms in patients. And the meal plan worked. You can see the study here.

Other than its healing properties, this healthy chicken barley soup is a great source of protein, B-vitamins, potassium and magnesium.

It can be great for weight loss too, as it’s low in calories, yet super satiating!

More Healthy Soup Recipes

I hope you enjoy this delicious homemade chicken soup with barley and vegetables! And if you love soup, make sure to check out these tasty recipes as well:

• Cauliflower Chicken Soup
• 20-Minute Chickpea Soup
• Easy Potato Carrot Soup