My recipe for French Onion Soup: Buy some nice beef stock. Peel and chop 8 cups of onions, etc, etc…
Jean Pierre’s recipe for French Onion Soup: Brown some leftover beef bones,…
Julia’s recipe for French Onion Soup: De-bone a young, grass fed Charolais cow…
For what it’s worth, Anthony Bourdain says many chefs use shallots, not onions. Not sure if you’d want to do that for French onion soup.
My French soup recipe:
Buy frozen French onion soup at Trader Joe’s. Heat as directed while lightly toasting a round of baguette bread. Put toast in bowl. Pour heated soup over. Add a slice of cheese to supplement the TJ’s cheese.
Butter. You have to use a lot of butter. Sticks of butter. Onions cooked in butter.
This. The butter. The reason restaurant meals taste so good is butter. Except when it’s cream.
Julia uses olive oil to begin then adds butter. I made it with leeks one time and it was excellent.
Because olive oil has a higher smoke temp than butter?
It’s not a terrible idea to make your own beef stock, especially considering how generally flavorless that store-bought beef broth tends to be. All you need is some oxtails and shanks, some water, a pot, and time. But you can also use chicken broth, which is better from the store, and cheaper to make.
We do a version very close to this:
French Onion Soup: the Cook’s Illustrated Way Recipe - Food.com
except we use sherry, not red wine, leave the balsamic vinegar out, and use gruyere, not asiago.
You can buy decent beef stock. It might cost more than a joint of beef and making your own.
Don’t feel bad, if your soup suits you and those you serve. It’s THE best.
Exactly. Equal parts butter and olive oil is her preferred fat for sauteeing and caramelizing in Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and it’s what I use to saute the onions and garlic when I start a batch of chili or marinara sauce.
A few years ago I made selleongtang, Korean beef bone broth that serves as the base of a spicy beef-rice-kimchi soup. It involves holding marrow bones at a rolling boil for about 8-9 hours until everything but the calcium itself has been wrung out of those bones. I started cooking at 5 PM and the soup was ready around 7 the following morning and it was delicious.
And don’t forget the salt.
Salt is overrated. MSG is what makes preserved foods taste good. It’s just harder to notice because MSG-phobia has lead manufacturers to find creative ways of “hiding” MSG in the ingredients list on packaging (yeast extract, soy protein, etc.)
I’ve never seen a chef on TV add MSG to anything they are making. Loads of butter, cream and salt though.
You’ve probably seem them add Worcestershire sauce or soy sauce or fish sauce to foods you wouldn’t associate with those flavors, though, because they’re full of natural glutamates that add umami.
And a lot of sodium, lol.
They open a bottle of fine red wine to use in their dishes. I use wine that comes in a box.
This is my go to. Sauté chopped shallots in olive oil and butter for 3-4 minutes, add in chopped garlic for another minute, throw in some herbes de Provence & salt & pepper, then deglaze with white wine. Makes a great base for risotto and sauces for chicken cutlets. Has the added bonus of smelling so delicious and fragrant that everyone in the house is absolutely ravenous by the time the food hits the table.
We do start with simmered beef chuck when making Thai noodles (like Pho). Fantastic broth and I never thought of using it for onion soup.
nit pick, Pho is Vietnamese and not Thai.
Yes, I was comparing since more people are familiar with Pho. The Thai version uses star anise and no cinnamon. Cilantro and bean sprouts for garnish. Restaurants also include basil but we don’t use it at home.
The recipe that I was taught for French onion soup begins by throwing a whole pile of bacon rashers into the pot and rendering out the fat to saute the onions and shallots. At this point I would take out the bacon, make a couple of bacon sandwiches and eat them while I continued cooking the soup. I used to make the soup in the morning for consumption that night. I don’t know if I imagined it but it always seemed tastier reheated. And the bacon sandwiches were a great breakfast.