A hearty meal in a bowl with tender beef, lots of vegetables, potatoes, barley, herbs and rich broth. Make it on the stove top or in a Instant Pot/pressure cooker. If you follow a gluten-free diet, skip the barley. The yield is 2 ½ quarts of soup (10 cups).
Slice off extra fat and tendons with a chef's knife. There is a lot of trimming on most beef chuck roasts and you will lose about 30% of the total weight. Trim into approximately 1-inch cubes.
Prep vegetables
Notes
Pressure/Instant Pot Method
Set pressure cooker to saute. When hjot, add the olive oil and brown meat. Don't crowd the meat, do in two batches. With all of the browned meat in the pot, add the tomato paste and stir with the meat to coat and caramelize. Pour meat into a medium bowl and save.
Add the second tablespoon of olive oil to the pot and sauté onions until soft and translucent. Add garlic and cook 1 minute more. Add wine to deglaze pan and reduce wine by half. Add all remaining ingredients, broth through pepper, and add the meat back in. Stir together.
Lock lid in place and bring up to high pressure; begin timing for 1o minutes. When done, bring pressure down with the quick release method, moving the pot to a sink and running cool water over it. You will hear the pressure release in about 20 seconds. Test a chunk of meat for tenderness. If it's not tender, lock up the pot, bring back to high pressure and cook for a few more minutes.
Remove bay leaf before serving.
Herbs Note:
For south-of-France flavor, use Herbs de Provence. It's a flavorful, traditional herb blend in France. You can substitute other dried herbs blends, such as Italian blend or just use dried thyme, oregano and a little rosemary. Use what you have, but try the Herbs de Provence sometime. It's delicious. For the recipe, use 1 ½ teaspoons.