Barley Roasted Vegetable & Feta Salad (Cooking Light, June 2007, p 222)

PREP: Average
TASTE: Fair
REPEAT: No
NOTES: Again, I planned unnecessarily for a double batch because of our family size, without considering the fact that it was a new recipe. Got to stop doing that! Also, I need to remember that if I am making a dish without meat, I need to prepare some meat on the side to go with it. Guess it's easy to tell that we are NOT vegetarians. It should be noted, however, that the dish was pretty filling without the meat for those who are vegetarians. Personally, I didn't care for the combination of the red wine vinegar with the dill. At least, I think that's the combo of flavors that kind of put me off. The kids wouldn't touch it so now I have this HUGE double batch of the stuff and I will, of course, try to eat what I can of it so it doesn't go to waste and more importantly, my grocery money doesn't go to waste.
BARLEY NOTES: Not sure if it was due to the double batch size of barley being cooked, but the level of water to barley and the cooking time were way off. I doubled the barley (Hulled Barley and it called for Pearl, maybe another reason for the difference?) to 2 cups and I'm not sure if I doubled the 4 cups of water or not. In any case, the Barley took 2 hours to finish, and even then the water wasn't all used. I had to pour out quite a bit of water at the end just to eat it, but the barley itself was fine. I think.

KEY INGREDIENTS: eggplant, red pepper, pearl barley, zucchini, yellow squash, parsley, mint, dill, orange rind, feta cheese