Zuppa di Orzo e Fagioli Borlotti del Friuli

Ingredients

• 200 g pearl barley, soaked overnight in cold water, drained
• 200 g dried borlotti beans, soaked overnight in cold water, drained
• 1 piece smoked prosciutto rind (cotenna del prosciutto), whole, left intact for simmering
• For the soffritto
• 200 g celeriac (sedano rapa), peeled and finely diced — not celery
• 1 medium carrot, finely diced
• 1 medium white onion, finely diced
• 2 tbsp olive oil, or Friulano lard
• 1 tbsp white Friulano wine (Tocai), added to the soffritto
• 1.5 litres water, cold, added after soffritto
• 2 g mixed herbs, bay leaf and a sprig of rosemary, tied
• To finish
• to taste fine sea salt, added only at the end of cooking
• 4 tsp raw olive oil or Friulano lard, for drizzling at the table
• few drops per bowl apple cider vinegar, optional; cuts through the rich bean-barley starch

Method

1. 1
   Warm the olive oil or lard in a heavy-based pot over medium-low heat. Add the diced celeriac, carrot and onion. Cook slowly, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables have softened and the onion is translucent — approximately 10 to 12 minutes. Add the Friulano wine and allow it to evaporate completely before proceeding. The soffritto is ready when the wine smell is gone and the vegetables have begun to catch the faintest colour.
2. 2
   Add the drained pearl barley and drained borlotti beans simultaneously to the pot. Nestle the prosciutto rind among them — whole and intact. Pour over 1.5 litres of cold water and add the tied herbs. Raise the heat to bring the pot to a gentle boil, then reduce immediately to the lowest possible simmer. The surface should tremble, not roll.
3. 3
   This is where the dish lives or dies. Maintain the lowest possible simmer for a minimum of 2 hours without interference, without salt, without vigorous stirring. At 1 hour the broth is still thin and the barley chalky at the centre — this is not ready. At 2 hours, the barley and beans will have released their starches together into a unified, porridge-thick broth. The surface will be dense and slow-moving. Drag a spoon through the centre: it should close back in on itself sluggishly.
4. 4
   Remove and discard the prosciutto rind and the tied herbs. If a creamier body is desired, ladle out roughly one quarter of the beans, pass them through a sieve or crush them briefly, and stir the purée back into the pot. The soup will deepen in colour and texture.
5. 5
   Season with fine sea salt now and only now. Taste and adjust. Because the soup has reduced over 2 hours, it will require less salt than expected. The flavour should be round, smoky and deep — the celeriac sweetness present but not dominant. Allow the pot to rest off the heat for 5 minutes before serving.
6. 6
   Ladle into deep bowls. Finish each portion with a drizzle of raw olive oil or a small amount of Friulano lard, and, if using, a few drops of apple cider vinegar added at the table. The acid is not decorative: it lifts the starch-heavy base and completes the bowl.