Soup-er!

Ha roo, pups and cool cats!  It's me, Zim!  As some long-time readers of the Ao4 Digest may know, I'm a huge fan of kitchen appliances.  As a Drill Sergeant, it is my duty to inspect new equipment and help test it out.  Imagine my delight when the FedEx man dropped this baby off on our doorstep last week:

"A slow cooker that also roasts, browns/sautés, and steams?!?  WOWZERS!"

Wowzers!  How exciting is that?!?   There was only one thing to do -

"Let's fire this baby up, Mom!"

We had to test drive it - right?!!?

I suggested we make some steamed Stinky Goodness, but Mom opted for Onion Soup instead.  Hmm.  Does anyone know what "Not a snowball's chance at the Equator" means?  Hmm.  She must have wanted to try out the sauté feature.  Fair enough!  Mom shared a couple pix on FaceBook and her friends wanted the recipe.  It's Mom's old standby recipe that is in her head, not written down, so I thought I'd take a shot at writing it up for everyone.  PLEASE NOTE:  Absolutely NO onion soup for us pups and kit-cats!!!  Sorry.  Bipeds only.

Ready to start cooking?  Here's what you'll need:

10 large sweet onions (use Vidalia if you can, yellow otherwise)
3 Tablespoons of butter (or for our friends in the south, buttah)
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
+/- 2 cups white wine  (Mom used a lovely Riesling; the better the wine, the better the soup)
2 cups chicken broth (or half chicken, half beef)
10 oz. apple juice or cider
basil, thyme, etc. to taste (I have no idea what that means - add green dried herbs that smell good together)
Shredded Parmesan Cheese

Now for the action!  Peel and trim the ends off the onions.  Slice into half-moons.  Set the new appliance to Sauté/300℉.  (If you're doing this on the stove, heat a Dutch oven on medium/low.)  Melt butter ...

... then start layering in the onions -- some onions, then Kosher salt, more onions, more salt, etc.  Do NOT stir until the onions have sweated down - 15 minutes or so.  (Mom has a hard time with that one - but really, it's best.  Leave it alone.)

"Leave it!" as they say.

After the onions have cooked down, stir occasionally until they're a wonderful, rich caramel color like this:

Mom wanted to eat them right then and there.  Just to let you know.

That could take anywhere from 30-60 minutes, depending on how your heat source is doing.  Be patient!

Now add enough wine to cover the onions.  Increase the heat, stir often, and reduce the wine to a syrupy consistency.  (If you're on the stove top, crank up the heat to high!)  Add the broth, apple juice and herbs.  Reduce heat, switch over to crock pot mode, cover, and leave for a couple hours.  (On the stove, turn to low, cover, and simmer until you're hungry.)

In the meantime, do this:

"Eyes... RIGHT!"

Dave and I like to work on our military drills while out on patrol.

Where were we?  Oh, right.  The soup.  By the time you get home, this is what your soup should look like:

Soup's on!

All that's left to do now is to enjoy!  Sometimes, Mom ladles it into bowls, tops with a slice of crusty bread and shredded Parmesan, then sticks it under the broiler to brown the cheese.  This weekend, she skipped that stage - she made some flatbread to have on the side and just tossed some Parm on top of the soup like so:

Looks like a soup-er Fall meal to me!  (Oh, please - you had to see that one coming, didn't you?  Ha roo roo roo!)

I'll add this recipe to our sidebar, in case anyone wants to refer back to it.  If you try it out, please let us know what you think -- and remember, no onions for us quadrupeds!  (But treats and walks are great ideas!)

Play bows,
Zim