SOUTHWESTERN CHICKEN CHILI WITH BARLEY

This comes from Quaker. I made half and made some adjustments. I omitted diced tomatoes. I used a little more chicken broth to make this soup and not a thicker chili, about 1 1/4 c. more, and used quick cooking pearl barley in place of medium pearl barley. I should have used more and will do so next time. I used a whole can of drained and rinsed beans instead of  half a can. We had the option of using tomato sauce or salsa so I used most of a jar of pureed mild Pace picante sauce, which is just a runny, less chunky salsa. It had all the salt I needed for the whole recipe. It also had a bit of heat so I didn't need pepper or dried chili flakes. I used one boneless skinless chicken breast that I baked in the oven for 15 minutes, then shredded with a folk. I added it after the soup had finished. The amount of chili powder and cumin in the recipe was perfect.

I grade this an A.