I might be expelled from Le Cordon Bleu -my school- making a French soup without cheese and bread. I just don't find it practical to eat the soggy bread. The core of the soup is caramelized onions and beef broth; it's earthy, almost sweet and very satisfying. If you want to have bread and cheese, make a grilled cheese and dip it to the soup just like a French dip sandwich, much easier to eat. Before making the soup, here are a few notes.
You need to use a pot with the largest surface area for faster results, and adjust the amount of onion/broth accordingly. In this recipe, I am using 8 pounds of onions, because that's what my largest/widest dutch oven Le Creuset #30(9 quarts) can hold.
It took me about 3 hours to reduce it to the dark brown phase of the onion -see pics below-. At the end it was reduced from 8 pound to 17 oz ( about the 8th of its original weight).
I make the soup a bit thicker than others using 1 pound onion to a 1 cup stock ratio. Start with this, you can always add more stock to thin it later.
You can add croutons"at the table" for crunch, if you want. I used toasted almonds, but really was not necessary.
This is one of the dishes that I use a lot of freshly cracked coarse white peppers, try if you have
I make my own stock when I can, but there is one brand I don't mind using. It can be found in Costco in chicken, beef and vegetarian flavours - picture at the bottom.
Ingredients
8 pounds of Maui, vidalia or other white onions, sliced thinly
8 cups of reduced sodium beef stock
4 tablespoons butter
3-4 tablespoons olive oil
4 tablespoons sherry or madeira
4 bay leaves
4 star anise
Directions
In a heavy, large dutch oven heat the butter and oil over medium heat
Add the star anise, and the onions and cook slowly stirring with a wooden spoon every few minutes - do not use high heat. Depends on how much surface area you are covering and how much onion you have this will take 1.5 to 3 hours, don't rush it
Once they are all same brown, coppery color and reduced to almost nothing, add the stock and scrape the bottom of the pan
Add the bay leaves and bring the soup to a boil, turn it down to lowest heat, and let it simmer for an hour or longer without the lid- you can make a day ahead if you want.
Turn it off, add sherry and mix well.
Discard bay leaves and star anise, season to taste with salt and pepper
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