Beef Barley Stew — What I Made When September Forgot to Need Me

September arrived and I did not go to school. For the first time in forty-three years, September did not pull me to the classroom, and the absence of the pull was like the absence of gravity — disorienting, freeing, wrong. I stood in my kitchen on the first Tuesday of September and felt the phantom classroom: the desks, the books, the students filing in with their August tans and their summer laziness and the particular energy of a new school year that is unlike any other energy on earth. I missed it. I missed it with my whole body.

But the kitchen was here. The stove was warm. The challah needed braiding. The brisket needed seasoning. The blog needed writing. And Marvin needed — Marvin needed me, constantly, completely, in the way that only a person who is losing himself needs the person who still knows who he is. I am Marvin's memory now. I am the external hard drive. Everything he has forgotten, I carry. The weight is considerable. But I am a woman who has carried thirty teenagers' essays home every weekend for forty-three years. I know how to carry.

I wrote a blog post about September — about the teacher's September and the cook's September, about how both begin with preparation and anticipation and the understanding that something important is about to happen. The teacher prepares lesson plans. The cook prepares the kitchen. Both stand at the front of a room and say: pay attention. This matters. What we are about to do here will nourish you. The medium is different. The message is the same.

The blog readership has jumped since retirement. I am writing more, and more people are finding the writing, and the writing is finding its audience the way water finds its level — naturally, inevitably, drawn by gravity toward the people who need it. Three thousand readers now. A woman in London wrote to say she makes my challah every Friday even though she is not Jewish because "the bread doesn't care about my religion, and neither does the prayer." I cried reading this. I cry easily now. The retirement has opened a valve that was held closed by the professional necessity of not crying in front of teenagers, and now the valve is open, and the tears come, and the tears go into the soup, and the soup is salted, and the salt is love.

Marvin and I have settled into a routine that is entirely ours — no school bell to interrupt, no commute to separate us. We are together from morning to night. This is either beautiful or unbearable, and most days it is both.

The brisket I mentioned in the story was already braised and resting by afternoon — but it was this beef barley stew that I came back to later in the week, when the quiet of the house felt loudest and I needed something to tend. Stew is a teacher’s recipe: it rewards patience, it builds in layers, and by the time it’s finished, every element has taught the others something. Marvin ate two bowls and called it “the good soup,” which is the highest praise he gives anything now, and I wrote it down in the notebook I keep of the things he still knows.

Beef Barley Stew

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cook Time: 1 hour 45 minutes | Total Time: 2 hours 5 minutes | Servings: 6

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 lbs beef chuck, cut into 1-inch cubes
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 medium yellow onion, diced
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 3 medium carrots, peeled and sliced into rounds
• 3 stalks celery, sliced
• 2 medium Yukon Gold potatoes, diced
• 1 cup pearl barley, rinsed
• 1 can (14.5 oz) diced tomatoes, undrained
• 6 cups beef broth
• 1 tablespoon tomato paste
• 1 teaspoon dried thyme
• 1 teaspoon dried rosemary
• 1 bay leaf
• Salt and black pepper to taste
• Fresh parsley, chopped, for garnish

Instructions

1. Brown the beef. Pat beef cubes dry with paper towels and season generously with salt and pepper. Heat olive oil in a large heavy-bottomed pot or Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add beef in a single layer (work in batches if needed) and sear until browned on all sides, about 3–4 minutes per side. Transfer to a plate and set aside.
2. Sauté the aromatics. Reduce heat to medium. Add onion and celery to the same pot and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 5 minutes. Add garlic and tomato paste and cook 1 minute more until fragrant.
3. Build the stew. Return the browned beef to the pot. Add carrots, potatoes, diced tomatoes with their juices, beef broth, thyme, rosemary, and bay leaf. Stir to combine and bring to a boil.
4. Add the barley. Once boiling, stir in the rinsed pearl barley. Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer for 1 hour 30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until beef is tender and barley is cooked through and has thickened the broth.
5. Finish and serve. Remove the bay leaf. Taste and adjust seasoning with salt and pepper as needed. Ladle into bowls and garnish with fresh chopped parsley.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 420 | Protein: 31g | Fat: 13g | Carbs: 44g | Fiber: 7g | Sodium: 780mg