French Onion Soup

 

I made a pot of French Onion Soup yesterday to keep us warm while we watching the very sad Michigan football teams get spanked on New Year’s Day. :(    At least the soup was good.  I saw a post earlier in the week over at My Carolina Kitchen and Sam made a delicious looking French Onion Soup but her twist on it was to dice the onions into very small pieces instead of the traditional slices.  I liked this idea and decided to give it a try.  And it gave me an excuse to use one of my favorite kitchen gadgets, the Vidalia Chop Wizard. I got mine at Bed, Bath, and Beyond and I am not sure if I have seen them at Target or not.  It comes with two sized inserts.  I used the smallest.  I use it all the time to get uniformly small onions and green and red peppers.  

 

I only wanted a small pot of soup so this recipe will make 4 to 6 bowls of soup.  It can easily doubled.   It’s hard to believe that such simple ingredients can make something so delicious.  The onion broth was rich and flavorful and the broiled Gruyere cheese on a piece of chewy Ciabatta bread that I had leftover from some Bruschetta that I had made the night before finished it off.  The soup tasted like it came from a good restaurant.  DELICIOUS!

French Onion Soup

1 1/2 pounds of onions (approximately 6 medium sized onions), diced (approximately 4 cups diced)

3 Tbsp. olive oil

2 Tbsp. butter

1 carton (32 oz.) of Beef Stock.

1 Cup Red or White wine  (I used some leftover red wine)

Bay leaf

Pinch of Thyme

Kosher salt

pepper

Gruyere cheese

French bread or Ciabatta bread slices

Place the olive oil and melt the butter in a soup stockpot over medium high heat.  Add the onions and stir.  Saute the onions until they turn a deep, golden brown color.  Reduce the heat a little bit at a time to be careful not to burn the onions (approximately 20 minutes).  Once the onions are done caramelizing and are a rich brown in color, deglaze your stock pot by adding the wine and stirring to get all the brown bits off the bottom of the pan.  Add the beef broth and stir.  Add the salt, pepper, bay leaf, and thyme and let simmer for 30 minutes to 1 hour. 

I ladled the hot soup into some oven proof bowls, cut a large piece of bread in half so the it would fit and placed it on top of the soup.  Then I sprinkled Gruyere cheese on top.  (Swiss cheese world work here too and I threw in some grated Jarlsburg that I had in the refrigerator.)  Broil between 2 and 3 minutes.  Watch carefully so that it doesn’t burn.  Next time I might add some Parmesan Reggiano to the cheese topping for extra deliciousness.  :)

This was so good and so much easier than I expected.  Next time you get a craving for some French Onion Soup, try and make it yourself.  It’s delicious and so easy.