Headvoice

Gratinee this!

A couple of weeks ago now, I found myself with a craving for French onion soup. You know the kind; dark, rich and sweet with a molten swiss cheese and bread topping... perfect fare for the onset of chilly weather.

The best version I can recall eating was at the Ritz Carlton Hotel dining room in Boston. I lived on the same block for a few years, and on special occasions it was my first choice. We ate there the night of my graduation from college, and I was invited to take a tour of the enormous kitchen.

The version of onion soup that the Ritz served was a dark caramel color, the result of using a rich, long simmered beef stock. It was served in an individual metal casserole, on top of a folded napkin covered dinner plate, steaming hot from the broiler. In the middle of the bowl floated a toasted croute made from a baguette with a bubbling hot swiss and Parmesan cheese topping.

It was rich, deeply satisfying, sweet, cheesy and meaty all at the same time. Sublime.

So off I went to Google to see what the Internet would provide for reference. It didn't take long to distill what it takes to make a superior French onion soup.

Obviously I needed some stock or broth, but I was not prepared to do that from scratch. Yes, the Ritz does... but honey my home doesn't have 32 cooks, just this one. So, no roasting of bones and vegetables with the endless simmering would be involved. Low sodium beef and chicken stock would have to do...

Onions of course were next. Some recipes used both red and white onions, which seemed a little wishy washy to me. And considering just how many onions were needed I didn't want to buy a bag of small ones, so I choose those big ass Spanish ones.

Garlic, check.
Baguette, check.
Swiss cheese (Whoa! Ten bucks for that little chunk!), check.
Butter, check. It's "French" so that is practically required.
Fresh thyme, check.

Now for the cooking back at home. Get out that large heavy pot you must have, enamelled cast iron is my recommendation and what I used.

In goes a few tablespoons of butter to melt, followed by the sliced onions. Lots of them. I used four very large onions, practically filling the five quart pot. A little salt, give it a stir to coat the onion slices and then cover and cook over medium heat.

It is at this point when a decent batch of this soup can be transformed into something wonderful. Some recipes in my research called for slowly caramelizing the onions for as long as an hour, stirring often to keep them from actually burning. I found that it can take as long as two full hours to get them perfectly dark brown, sticky and rich.

At this point, in goes the stocks, using equal proportions. Twigs of fresh thyme are next. No need to chop the stems, they are easily retrieved after cooking. A little salt and freshly ground black pepper are next, and then some slow simmering for half an hour or so...

Many recipes used Cognac or another spirit to finish the soup. I chose dry sherry. Then again, this isn't the Ritz!

I sliced the bread, brushing the slices lightly with garlic infused olive oil. Now it was time to fish out those two oven proof souffle dishes that would serve Mark and I individually.

The soup was finished with a glug of sherry and salt and pepper to taste and ladled into the bowls. A couple of the croutons and then the sliced Swiss cheese on top and into the raving hot oven with the broiler on full tilt.

Just a few minutes later we ate in silence, savoring how such simple ingredients can produce such complex and satisfying flavors. I wonder if the Ritz Carlton dining room in Boston still serves French Onion Soup Gratinee...

I do.

Headvoice flickr images

I started this blog in 2001 and last night I downloaded all the banner images used on the site. After some culling there are 471 shots as of today.

In summary there is a lot of white dogs, Mark and myself, and flowers and pictures around the pool; with a smattering of Barnegat Light and London. An odd collection to be sure. But then what is normal?

There is some interesting internet traffic on some images... Luigi, candles and pool shots are used around the world. That happens when folks just link to the image rather than grabbing it for themselves. One shot of three candles was all over an African American dating site, and somewhat discomforting was a shot of flowers I took on an Arabic web site, which looked pretty extremist, but then again I couldn't read the content.

Click here to see all of them.