French Onion Soup

I love, love, love onions. I read about deglazing your pan more than once when caramelizing onions to maximize flavor and I am confident you will be in love with this recipe! It’s all about the technique here, not any secret ingredient to make it taste this good. I hope you follow me on this journey of great comfort food!

Tip: Do not use sweet onions for this recipe. They will be to sweet after the caramelization process.

Ingredients:

• 6 large cooking onions
• 1/4 cup of butter
• 2 tsp of kosher salt
• water for deglazing the pot
• 1/4 cup of sherry
• 1/4 cup of vermouth
• 4 cups of water
• 4 cups of chicken stock
• 2 cups of beef broth
• spring of fresh thyme
• 2 bay leafs
• salt and pepper to taste
• toasted sliced baguettes
• Mozza or Gruyère cheese

Directions:

First off I put my butter in a dutch oven and melt it on the stove top then turn the heat off.  Cut all your onions in even size slices, and put in your dutch oven. Sprinkle with the kosher salt. The onions  should almost reach the top of a standard size dutch oven. Give it a bit of a toss to coat the onions and sides of your dutch oven with the butter, and distribute the salt.

Now put the lid on this and place in a 425 degree Fahrenheit oven for 1 hour to start softening them and cook them.

There is reason why we do this:

1. In the oven this will cook evenly as there is heat from all sides of the pot and no caramalization will take place. Which is a good thing at this point because we don’t have to worry about burning the onions before they start to cook.
2.  It decreases the amount of time you are stuck stirring them on the stove top and making sure they don’t burn. Remember black is bad, brown is good.

Ok so after an hour has passed there will be a lot of liquid and they will have become somewhat translucent, and softened.

Now turn on your stove top to medium high. The first 20 minutes or so will require little stirring as there is a lot of liquid to be reduced before any caramelization takes place. Once the liquid evaporates you need to plant your feet in front of that burner and start keeping a closer eye on these babies.

Stir often!! Remember black=bad, brown=good. When your onions start to lose their structure and deepen in color and no liquid is left you need to start scraping the BROWN fond off the sides of your pot and the bottom.

Now we are ready to deglaze our pot with the first 1/4 cup of water. Stir that in and keep stirring and scraping the brown bits back into the onions.

Once that water has reduced your onions should take on a deeper color:

Lets do this again shall we:

Wow check out that color and the smell!

Now if you think the color needs to deepen a bit more by all means deglaze the pot with water a third time. Repeating the whole process described above.

Our final deglaze will be with the sherry and vermouth. I like using vermouth along with the traditional sherry because vermouth is a fortified wine made with various herbs and spices.

Once the alcohol has been reduced I then add the water, chicken and beef broths and my spring of fresh thyme, and salt and pepper to taste.

Turn your burner down to simmer and cook this for an additional 30 minutes to blend flavors.

Now comes the best part! Take your oven proof soup bowls and add a toasted baguette slice or two or three 😉

Ladle some soup in there, darn I missed the million dollar shot! Add Gruyère or Mozza  cheese to the top and place in the oven under broiler till cheese is melted and bubbly. Enjoy!

 

French Onion Soup

• Servings: 8
• Time: 3hrs
• Difficulty: medium
• Print

 

Ingredients:

• 6 large cooking onions
• 1/4 cup of butter
• 2 tsp of kosher salt
• water for deglazing the pot
• 1/4 cup of sherry
• 1/4 cup of vermouth
• 4 cups of water
• 4 cups of chicken stock
• 2 cups of beef broth
• spring of fresh thyme
• 2 bay leafs
• salt and pepper to taste
• toasted sliced baguettes
• Mozza or Gruyère cheese

Directions:

First off I put my butter in a dutch oven and melt it on the stove top then turn the heat off.  Cut all your onions in even size slices, and put in your dutch oven. Sprinkle with the kosher salt. The onions  should almost reach the top of a standard size dutch oven. Give it a bit of a toss to coat the onions and sides of your dutch oven with the butter, and distribute the salt.

Now put the lid on this and place in a 425 degree Fahrenheit oven for 1 hour to start softening them and cook them.

After an hour return the dutch oven to the stove top remove the lid and turn the burner on med-high.  The first 20 minutes or so will require little stirring as there is a lot of liquid to be reduced before any caramelization takes place. Once the liquid evaporates you need to plant your feet in front of that burner and start keeping a closer eye on these babies.

When your onions start to lose their structure and deepen in color and no liquid is left you need to start scraping the BROWN fond off the sides of your pot and the bottom.

Now we are ready to deglaze our pot with the first 1/4 cup of water. Stir that in and keep stirring and scraping the brown bits back into the onions.

Once that water has reduced your onions should take on a deeper color. Deglaze a second time with another 1/4 cup of water.

Our final deglaze will be with the sherry and vermouth. I like using vermouth along with the traditional sherry because vermouth is a fortified wine made with various herbs and spices.

Once the alcohol has been reduced I then add the water, chicken and beef broths and my spring of fresh thyme, and salt and pepper to taste.

Turn your burner down to simmer and cook this for an additional 30 minutes to blend flavors.

Now comes the best part! Take your oven proof soup bowls and add a toasted baguette slice or two or three 😉

Ladle some soup in there, add Gruyère or Mozza  cheese to the top and place in the oven under broiler till cheese is melted and bubbly. Enjoy!

Roasted Butternut Squash Soup

Super simple easy soup

Ingredients:

• 2 butternut squash
• 3 medium cooking onions
• 2 apples(if you like a bit more sweetness to shine through)
• 1/4 cup of butter
• 2 tbsp of olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 tbsp of fresh rosemary chopped fine
• 1 tbsp of fresh thyme
• 1 tsp of red chile pepper flakes
• 8 cups of chicken stock

Directions:

Turn your oven onto 425 degree Fahrenheit

Chop up your onions, butternut squash and apples in medium size pieces. This will make a lot! I divided it between two half sheet pans.  Then season to taste with salt and pepper. Add your knobs of butter and drizzle with olive oil.

After 20 minutes in oven, stir up veggies so they caramelize on all sides. Once fork tender remove from oven. Total cooking time approximately 40 minutes.

Let your veggies cool off then in batches puree them with some chicken stock and place in soup pot:

Once all the vegetables are pureed add the rest of your chicken stock to your soup pot and stir.  Let simmer on medium low heat. Taste your soup to see if you need to season it more. At this point you will also add your fresh herbs and my favorite ingredient to give the soup a bit of a kick.

 

At the very end of the cooking process I add a bit of half and half maybe 1/2 cup and use an immersion blender to get the soup silky smooth.

I serve this with croutons in the soup and fresh grated parmesan cheese on top! Enjoy! (I also saved the seeds and roasted them for a garnish)

 

Roasted Butternut Squash Soup

• Servings: 10-12
• Time: 1hr
• Difficulty: easy
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Ingredients:

• 2 butternut squash
• 3 medium cooking onions
• 2 apples(if you like a bit more sweetness to shine through)
• 1/4 cup of butter
• 2 tbsp of olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 tbsp of fresh rosemary chopped fine
• 1 tbsp of fresh thyme
• 1 tsp of red chile pepper flakes
• 8 cups of chicken stock
• 1/2 cup half and half

Directions:

Turn your oven onto 425 degree Fahrenheit

Chop up your onions, butternut squash and apples in medium size pieces. This will make a lot! I divided it between two half sheet pans.  Then season to taste with salt and pepper. Add your knobs of butter and drizzle with olive oil. Place your sheet pans in the oven.

After 15 minutes in oven, stir up veggies so they caramelize on all sides. Once fork tender remove from oven. Total cooking time approximately 30-45 minutes.

Let your veggies cool off then in batches puree them with some chicken stock and place in a soup pot.

Once all the vegetables are pureed add the rest of the chicken stock to your soup pot and stir.  Let simmer on medium low heat. Taste your soup to see if you need to season it more. At this point you will also add your fresh herbs and chili pepper flakes.

At the very end of the cooking process add a bit of half and half, maybe 1/2 cup and use an immersion blender to get the soup silky smooth.

I serve this with croutons in the soup and fresh grated parmesan cheese on top! Enjoy!

Beef Leftover’s Barley Soup

I love soup!!!!

OK first off this recipe kind of requires the leftovers from my Crockpot roast beef  recipe.
So please take a look at that recipe post first.

Ingredients:

• left over gravy from the crock pot roast
• left over roast beef
• carrots (1 /2 cups)
• celery (if I had some I would have used 2-3 stalks)
• 1 med sized cooking onion
• 8 cups of water
• 1 can of crushed tomatoes
• 1 tbsp dried parsley
• 2 tsp soy sauce
• 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
• 2/3 cup of barley
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

First take your left over gravy from the pot roast and add to a large soup pot, fill with 8 cups of water. Whisk this with salt and pepper to your liking. I use 1 tsp of salt and 1 tsp of pepper (approximately). Add your soy sauce and Worcestershire sauce. These are added to enhance the beefy-ness of the stock. These two items are great to pull out more intense beef flavors when working with beef.

Ok now I take whatever vegetables I have in the fridge to add to my soup. I added 1 yellow onion chopped small.

1/2 bag of baby carrots chopped small.

Cut up whatever roast you have remaining to add to the soup. Now keep in mind my roast was not that big(maybe 2.5-3 lbs) so I had maybe 3/4 cup of chopped up meat. If you have a huge ass roast obviously you aren’t going to chop up and add 4 cups of meat or you will need a bigger pot and more water 😉

Alright now let that boil away like Grizelda’s cauldron  and cackle at your accomplishment so far 🙂 Any Canadian’s who grew up with the Hilarious House of Frankenstein will know I was trying to take a stab at funny there 🙂 🙂

Welllll, as Grizelda would say!! Now that your vegetables are tender and the stock has reduced a bit we have managed to concentrate those flavors!

Go ahead and add your 1 can of crushed tomatoes and 2/3 cup of barley to the soup

Your soup will have a great body to it from the starches in the barley. Stir occasionally and the last ingredient I add is the parsley flakes just before the soup is done to brighten the flavor a bit.

That is about it people. Turn off your stove and you can taste and adjust with any further salt or pepper.

ENJOY!!!!!

Left-over Beef Barley Soup

• Servings: 6-8
• Time: 1hr
• Difficulty: easy
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ingredients:

• left over gravy from the crock pot roast
• left over roast beef
• carrots (1 /2 cups)
• celery (if I had some I would have used 2-3 stalks)
• 1 med sized cooking onion
• 8 cups of water
• 1 can of crushed tomatoes
• 1 tbsp dried parsley
• 2 tsp soy sauce
• 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
• 2/3 cup of barley
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

First take your left over gravy from the pot roast and add to a large soup pot, fill with 8 cups of water. Whisk this with salt and pepper to your liking. I use 1 tsp of salt and 1 tsp of pepper (approximately). Add your soy sauce and Worcestershire sauce. These are added to enhance the beefy-ness of the stock. These two items are great to pull out more intense beef flavors when working with beef.

Ok now I take whatever vegetables I have in the fridge to add to my soup. I added 1 yellow onion chopped small and 1/2 bag of baby carrots chopped small.

Cut up whatever roast you have remaining to add to the soup. (I had 3/4 cup)

Let the soup boil and the vegetables cook. Now that your vegetables are tender and the stock has reduced a bit we have managed to concentrate those flavors!

Go ahead and add your 1 can of crushed tomatoes and 2/3 cup of barley to the soup

Your soup will have great body to it from the starches in the barley. Stir occasionally and the last ingredient to add is the parsley flakes.

Turn off your stove and you can taste and adjust with any further salt or pepper.

Enjoy