Homemade French Onion soup of the Gods

Cafe Society
1

Okay, I just tried out a recipe at home. I made us a batch of french onion soup. And OMG I have been translated bodily into heaven!

The key is to brown the HELL out of the onions. Really!

I took 4 pounds of yellow onions, sliced 'em into 1/4 inch pieces, and stuck 'em in a dutch oven sprayed liberally with PAM & with 3 tbsp of butter and a tsp of salt, and stuck all that, covered, into the oven at 400 degrees.

Then, after an hour, I stirred 'em up, and left the lid ajar a bit and returned them to the oven for another hour.

After that, I stirred 'em again, making sure to dislodge all the crusty bits all over, and tucked it back in the oven for another 45 minutes.

By this time, those puppies were golden brown and soft!

But I was not yet done with the browning!

Onto the burner at medium heat went the dutch oven! It simmered for about 20 minutes, lid off, with frequent stirring, until a tasty brown crust had formed on the bottom. That got deglazed with 1/4 cup of hot water, a lot of stirring, then allowed to form another brown crust on the bottom of the pan over the next 6-10 minutes or so. Another 1/4 cup of water was added, everything deglazed, reduced for another 6-10 minutes, and repeated again with another 1/4 cup of water.

By this time, the mix was not golden brown, but a deep caramel color, and smelled of heaven! But now it was time to add 1/2 cup of cooking sherry, and deglaze that brown crust on the bottom yet again. The sherry reduced over 10-15 minutes, forming another brown crust on the bottom!

I now had a mix of onions that looked more like chocolate caramel iced cream!

I then triumphantly added 2 1/2 cups of beef consomme, 4 cups of chicken stock, and stirred it all up, once more deglazing the whole apparatus. 6 sprigs of fresh thyme tied together, and a single bay leaf were then added, and it simmered on low for about 40 minutes.

As it simmered, I toasted some 1/2 inch thick sliced baguettes in the toaster oven at 400 degrees for about 6 minutes, until they were golden brown, dug out my mom’s old onion soup crocks, grated 3/4 of a pound of 10 month old gruyere cheese, and set the oven to broil!

I then fished the thyme and bay leaf out of the soup, added some fresh ground pepper, & filled 4 individual crocks each with about a cup and a half of the onion soup. I then floated the toasted baguettes in the broth, and covered them liberally with the gruyere.

Then it all went into the oven for about 5 minutes, until the cheese was browned and bubbly! It cooled for 4 minutes before we couldn’t resist anymore, and dove in!

Good Og, the flavor! Nothing like the insipid onion soups I’ve been suffering through all these years! Heady flavor, aged cheese that was just the right texture without being too stringy, and the sweetness of the onion brought out to a T! No excess saltiness either, which amazed the Mrs., who can’t abide salty foods.

I tell ya, the secret is in carmelizing those damned onions. It took me over 3 hours to get it done right, but boy oh boyardee, was it worth it!

And there’s still enough left over to make another two bowls!

I loves me some euphoric recall…

Anyone else out there have any reminiscences about good onion soup? :smiley:

2

Oops! I only used about 6 ounces of cheese, not 12!

3

i followed the alton brown version of french onion soup and was very happy with the results. i don’t remember all of the details, but i do remember it was a half day event to brown the onions properly.

4

God, it sounds good. That’s a good idea to do the onion browning in the oven.

Good use of exclamation points to highlight the thrills cooks experience when working magic in the kitchen.

I’ve made it before and I love it, but the mister doesn’t care much for it and it’s too much work for just me to eat it on my own. But I’ll often order it in a French bistro.

5

That sounds like a great recipe - I love French Onion Soup. But four pounds of onions? A gallon and a half of liquid? How many people were you serving?

I can very happily spend an entire afternoon in the kitchen if the results are worth it.

6

It reduces quite a bit.

The recipe states it makes about 6 1.5 cup servings. That seems about accurate for what I had left over, having served 4 people.

7

I haven’t tried your method, but I second the recommendation that you’ve got to reduce the HELL out of your onions.

Too many people just cook the onions down until they’re soft, which is what a lot of onion soup recipes tell you to do. Nuh uh. You’ve got to keep cooking them and cooking them until they’re brown and sweet and more like jam than anything else. And then cook them a bit more for good measure.

8

It sounds wonderful…but 3 hours…for soup?
Geez…I take it your main course should be finished sometime in April?
I will book a flight and be at your house in time for dessert - about June 15th or so…I’ll start fermenting the bottle of wine I will be bringing you.

9

You can’t hurry perfection.

10

Most of that time the onions are taking care of themselves in the oven. And no doubt perfuming the house (and maybe the neighborhood) with a lovely caramelized onion smell.

Doc, did your nearest neighbors come out of their houses and stand sniffing in their front yards and drooling?

11

Where does one find soup crocks? I can’t find them in Target…I want the big old hefty ones that can double as a doorstop.

Off to Google…I was going to make pasta a la Ivylass tonight, but now I am craving French Onion Soup. Damn you, Qadgop!

12

OK, I just made a decision…I’m getting us a second dutch oven. I’m using ours this morning to make that amazing no-knead bread recipe, and then my husband is using it the rest of the day to make pot roast. If we had a second one, I would definitely be making onion soup today. Dang.

13

When I was taught how to make French Onion Soup the first step was to fry up about half a pound or more of bacon. Take it out of the pan and make toasted BLT sandwiches. Eat the sandwiches while preparing the onions. Heat up the congealed bacon fat and proceed as usual.

It only improves it about 100%.

14

That sounds delicious, and not as time consuming as it seems because you’re not constantly standing over the stove. I remember making French onion soup with a friend in high school for our French class, and crying and crying as we cut the onions.

I think you’re confusing quart with gallon. Not counting the de-glazing liquid, there was only six and a half cups of liquid added, or roughly one and a half quarts. (There are four cups to a quart, and four quarts to a gallon.)

15

The recipe sounds good but I would suggest a couple things that will put it over the top. I’d use beef stock home made if at all possible. in almost all cases plain water is better than canned stock (I’d say all but some nitpicker will come along with some crazy scenario that canned will help). Using white wine and some cognac will give a depth of flavor to the broth; the long cooking time ensures that all the alcohol cooks off for those squeamish about such things.

16

Hear, hear!

17

I fear I would burn the living hell out of the onions following your method. I’d come back and they’d be a smoking, rank, black mess charcoalized to the bottom of my dutch oven.
In your final soup, do the onions still have any texture, or is the soup more or less homogeneous? I imagine the final product being a beefy, oniony delight, but different than my soup which is beefy and oniony but with big mouthfuls of sweet, caramelized onion. I tend to make soup with big chunks, like Ben & Jerry make ice cream with big chunks.

18

Go to a restaurant supply store for stuff like that. I got six soup crocks for not much money at all.

Beware, though–if you’re like me you’ll find it hard to escape with just the one thing you went there looking for.

19

There’s still plenty of texture, but they are soft.

And nothing burned in the prep of this soup, surprisingly.

20

My best onion soups are a byproduct. When onions are on sale, I buy a 3 pound bag, and chop them to make a batch of glazed onions.

3 pounds chopped onions and one stick of butter in a slow cooker. Three to six hours, or until a sample taste makes you fall to your knees to thank your chosen deity. Freeze most of it in sandwich zippibags. The rest, and all the liquid, combines with chicken stock to make a soup that will cause your own daddy to smack your momma. Og have mercy!