Skip to main content

French Onion Soup

Welcome back! 
Today, we have a popular soup that actually dates from ancient times, though it gained its popularity since the 1960s. Surprisingly, this increase in demand was seen first in the United States rather than France, where people were eating fun French food like escargot. Although the dish seems simple (a big pot full of onions, right?), it's actually quite time consuming to make and involves many steps that we'll go over. But in the end, you get a nice authentic soup to enjoy!

French Onion Soup


Makes 4-6 servings

Ingredients:

  • 3 large sweet onions, thinly sliced (this should be about 8 to 10 cups)
  • 3 tablespoons olive oil
  • 2 tablespoons butter
  • 1 teaspoon sugar
  • 1 tablespoon garlic, minced
  • 1/2 cup white wine
  • 4 to 6 cups beef broth (depending on how concentrated you want it to be, we used 4 cups)
  • 1/2 teaspoon thyme (dry or fresh)
  • Salt and pepper to taste
Serve this alongside some baguette slices topped with cheese (we used Gruyere).

Directions:

  1. In a Dutch oven, put the oil and onions in and cook until soft. (About 15 minutes)
  2. Add the butter and cook until the mixture is light brown. (About another 15 minutes)
  3. Add the sugar to help it caramelize and cook until dark brown. (About 10 minutes)
  4. Add the garlic in and cook for about 5 minutes.
  5. Add the white wine and cook for another 5 minutes. At this point, there should be about 2 cups of soup in the pot.
  6. Add the beef broth and thyme and cook for about 10 minutes. The onions have been cooking for an hour now, and the everything should be at the right consistency.
  7. Add salt and pepper to taste.
  8. While cooking the soup, cut up a baguette into slices that will fit in your bowl. Top them with cheese.
  9. Split the soup into cups. Put a baguette slice in each and then broil it in the oven until the cheese is melted.
  10. Voila! It's now ready to eat!
This process is pretty long, but it's worth it. You could also serve the bread on the side if you rather it be dry and crunchy but it's traditionally supposed to be in the soup.
It pairs nicely with lots of other dishes, like a light salad for a soup and salad combo. We had it alongside a tuna sandwich, which was also great.
Also, one serving of this soup is pretty much half of a large onion. That's a lot of onion!

-Chefpo

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Banana Chiffon Cake

Welcome back!  Today, we have another recipe for when you want to use some of your extra bananas! Unlike the Banana Bread from last time, this one is basically a chiffon cake that is modified to accommodate for the bananas. It keeps the really light and fluffy texture of the cake while also having the banana flavor, and it also goes nicely with other fresh fruit like shown below.  Banana Chiffon Cake Makes one 9-10" pan Ingredients: For the egg yolk mixture: 7 egg yolks 2 tablespoons sugar 2 medium bananas 80 grams oil 90 grams orange juice 110 grams cake flour 10 grams corn starch 1 teaspoon baking powder 1/4 teaspoon baking soda For the egg white mixture: 7 egg whites 110 more grams of sugar 1 teaspoon lime/lemon juice Directions: Mix the egg yolks and 2 tablespoons of sugar. Then, add oil and mix thoroughly. Then, add orange juice and mix. Then, add vanilla extract. Sift the flour along with the baking soda and baking powder and add it in the egg yolk mixture. Gently fold ...

Key Lime Pie

Welcome back!  Today, we have one of my favorite desserts: Key Lime Pie! There's so many things that are great about this dish from the texture to the combination of flavors. Plus, I prefer the flavor of key limes as compared to normal limes, as key limes are tarter and more citrus-y. Now this is a sour dish, so if that's not your thing, then you can cut back on some of the key lime juice and it'll be better. Any way, it's a great dessert! Key Lime Pie Makes a 10" tart pan or 9" pie pan Ingredients: Crust: 2 1/2 cups almond flour 6 tablespoons butter, diced 1/4 cup sugar Pinch of salt If you want to use graham crackers for the crust, use about 1 1/2 cups (150 grams) of crushed graham cracker crumbs (about 10 sheets) along with 5 tablespoons melted butter and mix. Filling: 4 egg yolks* 1 14-ounce can of condensed milk 2/3 cup key lime juice (about 1 pound of key limes should be enough for decorations too) 1 tablespoon key lime zest *If you don't want to use...

Tiramisu

Welcome back to Chez Chefpo!  Today, we've got a classic Italian dessert: Tiramisu! No twists on this one, this is your classic tiramisu that's about as traditional as it gets. In fact, it's truly comparable to the authentic tiramisu that you could find in Italy (more about this below)! While this is not the cheapest recipe, it is actually pretty easy and is definitely worth making because it is veramente delicioso! Tiramisu Makes one 7" by 9" pan Ingredients: Cream: 4 egg yolks 50 grams sugar 16 ounces Mascarpone cheese (preferably room temperature) 200 grams heavy whipping cream 2-3 tablespoons Kahlua* Coffee Mixture: 120 mL cooled espresso (if you don't have this, 2 tablespoons of espresso powder plus 120 mL of hot water will do) 2-3 tablespoons Kahlua* You will also need: 1 package, or about 24, lady fingers Cocoa powder to be dusted onto the top *If you don't have Kahlua, you can just use rum.  Here's a reference for some of the more special ingre...