I drifted a little from the Daring Cook challenge, about consommé and clarifications. Well I made an onion soup.
I don’t know why many foreigner think a French onion soup is haute cuisine, because it is so much the contrary in French culture.
Peta, of the blog Peta Eats, was our lovely hostess for the Daring Cook’s September 2011 challenge, “Stock to Soup to Consommé”. We were taught the meaning between the three dishes, how to make a crystal clear Consommé if we so chose to do so, and encouraged to share our own delicious soup recipes!
So, it’s a very casual type of soup. An old tradition is to serve “soupe à l’oignon” in the morning, very early… The baked gratinee is a street stall food. That was prepared as breakfast for staff, at the food market in Lyon. Wiki, gives 2 other old traditions, all very homely. Maybe more about that later.
Maybe it’s getting out of fashion, but a drink-soup is/was often served at the end of a big party, after dancing and drinking all night, just before the guests leave. It’s not likely you can serve everybody at a table. Often it’s in mugs, or even paper cups.
That’s how I prepared it when I was a student. That takes 10 minutes to cut and stir-fry onions in a little oil (or oil + butter) till they start making caramel. Wet with wine and a little brandy, add stock or water, let simmer 15 minutes, check spices, decorate with herbs if you have some. Here : red onion red wine, Suntory XO brandy, “yeast stock” and sage.
For the stock, water, laurel, salt and pepper, it is perfect for a Gratinee (baked soup) with plenty of cheese.
For the simple soup, if I have some hen or pot-au-feu stock leftovers, I use them. A cube stock or “viandox” are just well. I don’t like the industrial products much because they are loaded with glutamate sodium, preservatives, coloring.
The viandox is some industrial yeast instant soup stock. It’s easy to make one’s one mix with what you have in the kitchen :
Yeast stock :
1 liter of water
1 tbs beer yeast (the one from the pharmacy, not for bread)
2 leaves of laurel
1 tbs soy sauce
1/2 ts sugar/honey (I skip as onions are sweet enough)
1 pinch of curry mix spices powder
pepper and salt
To make it a meal : croutons (dry old bread) rubbed with garlic, grated cheese, pour the hot onion soup on top.
GOURMANDE in OSAKA 