French onion soup

2015-02-22 and many others

This is the traditional French recipe, which is a bit more involved than the simplified version.

I don't do this very often. Unless you dry-cook them, it can take a long time to dry the onions sufficiently before they start to caramelize.

Use regular yellow onions for this. The oversize sweet Texas onions are so sweet that they don't need to be caramelized, possibly even should not. It makes the soup too sweet, even unpleasantly so.

A word of warning:
Some people may have problems with onion soup. Until you know for sure that you are not one of those people, better stay close to a bathroom for a few hours after you have sampled this. Onion soup can produce a lot of gas and for some it may even be an explosively powerful laxative.

INGREDIENTS

This is what you need for per serving:

  • 1 large sweet onion
  • 1 pint of beef stock
  • 1 slice of bread,
    preferably toasted
  • ½ cup shredded melting cheese
  • S&P
Pic1: French onion soup, mix up that goodness

Directions

 

Pic2: slice onions in thin wedges
Pic3: caramelize — about halfway here
Pic4: add stock, simmer

 

Pic5: serve in bowl
Pic6: add toast
Pic7: cheese au gratin

 

 


a very dense onion soup

 When I prepare onion soup this way, I tend to make it a lot denser, more onions with less water than with the stewing method. This soup was prepared in the same way as above but with 3 large onions and only about 1 quart of water. The bread absorbed almost all the liquid.

Directions

2020-09-25

Pic8-10: cooking

 

Pic11-13: serving

 

Pic14-16: served