French Onion Soup

Since this recipe calls for 3 pounds of onions, plus a little more at the end, I like to use the giant sweet onions that show up at farmer’s markets in the early Fall. About three of those big ones weigh in at three pounds.

Slicing all those onions can cause a lot of grief, but I have learned a trick that seems to help in avoiding tears. Someone once told me that if the cutting board is first wiped down with vinegar, all will be well. When I asked the person whom I thought gave me this tip, he looked blank, but it seems to help, so I continue to use a little white vinegar rubbed over the cutting surface before I launch into the onions.

It is a little harder to have homemade beef stock on hand than chicken stock. Any time a chicken has been cooked, the remains can be thrown in a pot with some vegetables to cook up broth, but steak and chop meat don’t give a cook anything to work with. The true French way is to roast bones and vegetables for hours, then deglaze, add further ingredients, and cook down. Another possibility is to put marrowbones in a soup pot, along with onion, carrots, celery, parsley, cook and skim.

The simplest way is to use a prepared stock. As always, this requires some careful reading of labels to check out salt and sugar content. A recent survey of a supermarket assortment showed that salt could range from 17 to 40 % of daily requirements.

Traditionally, French Onion Soup comes with toasted bread and shredded Gruyere cheese on top (which requires putting the already heated soup, with its decorations, under the broiler). But there are other possibilities. For instance, sautéing an onion lightly and adding that at the end, plus a little grated parmesan, will give the soup some extra body and flavor without having to worry about getting individual bowls of boiling soup in and out of the oven.

Ingredients

6 Tbsp butter

1 Tbsp olive oil

3 lbs. yellow onions, peeled and thinly sliced

1 tsp sugar

Salt (depending on broth)

1 Tbsp flour

8 cups beef stock

2 cups dry white wine

Pepper

Baguette

1lb. Gruyere, shredded

Directions

1. Melt 3 Tbsp butter over medium-low heat, add oil and onions and cook covered 30 minutes.
2. Increase heat to medium-high, add sugar and cook uncovered until golden brown.
3. Sprinkle flour, and cook for 3 minutes uncovered.
4. Add 2 cups of stock and stir to blend.
5. Add remaining stock and wine. Adjust salt and pepper and simmer 20 minutes.

For Serving with Gruyere

1. Put oven on broil (low)
2. Slice and butter bread
3. Toast in oven until just golden brown on both sides
4. Add toast and soup to (ovenproof) bowls
5. Spread shredded Gruyere on top
6. Put bowls on a baking sheet and broil until cheese bubbles and begins to brown.

Salmon Chowder

The big sweet onions that arrive in the fall have been appearing at the farmers’ markets, so I was tempted to write up French Onion Soup. Last year I didn’t stock up before the onions sold out. But as I associate French Onion soup with lunch on cool fall days, with Tarte Tatin for dessert, my suggestion is to stock up on the onions  -they keep well in a cool, dry place- and the recipe will follow anon.

This week’s recipe is for a fish chowder. It originated in Finland, which is easy to tell by the ingredients. Decades ago, when we first visited Norway, there were only local products available and fish and potatoes could appear at every meal.  This is an American adaptation, with such time saving products as bottled clam juice. The recipe calls for roasted salmon, but the difficulty these days of finding fish that is neither farm raised nor previously frozen means that other options might be called for.

One possibility is to use canned salmon. I have made the soup this way and it came out well. It was not quite the same in terms of consistency, but it was tasty and enjoyable. There are other fishes that look like salmon, such as steelhead trout, but I do not know if that would give the same result in terms of flavor.

This soup does not take very long to cook and does not get pureed, so it is a relatively short procedure. Because it calls for low fat milk and fish, it makes a substantial and healthy meal.

Ingredients

1 tsp butter

3 cups chopped onion

¼ cup flour

1 8 oz bottle clam juice

4 cups peeled and cubed potatoes

1 ½ cups thinly sliced carrots

3 ½ cups low fat milk

10 oz cooked (roasted) salmon

2 Tbsp chopped fresh or 2 tsp dried dill

¼ tsp Worcestershire sauce

Directions

1. Melt butter in soup pot. Add onions and cook 5 minutes
2. Stir in flour. Cook 1 minute
3. Gradually add clam juice and bring to a boil. Cook stirring until thick
4. Add potatoes and carrots, stir in milk. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes
5. Break salmon into chunks and add with dill and Worcestershire sauce. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and cook 10 minutes or until potatoes are tender.

Chocolate Zucchini Cake with Bourbon Glaze

“What’s going on?” you are saying, “This is a soupsite and if I want cakes, I have other places to go.” 

You are right, but here is the problem. We may not live in the pot luck capital of the country, but there are at least half a dozen occasions a year when local organizations, town groups, friends, or holiday gatherings require that I supply what used to be called “a covered dish.” This was a quaint way of saying that each person is expected to supply a prepared dish to serve a group of people.

Soup just doesn’t work. First, it requires the host to supply a specialized set of tools: bowls and soupspoons. Second, it doesn’t fit into the three-part movement of a pot luck gathering: pre-meal snacks, main dishes, desserts.

So I have had to rely on a (seasonal) list of offerings, and this being the end of summer, here is one for the Labor Day Weekend. It is a cake made with one of those large zucchinis people are trying to unload from their late summer gardens.

It should be made a day ahead, not only for convenience, but because the Bourbon Glaze is actually like a marinade. It soaks into holes and is absorbed by the cake. The cake can be baked in several different kinds of pans, but first choice in terms of presentation would be a Bundt pan. One long loaf or two regular ones would also work, especially if you want to freeze one.

I had said that new recipes would appear on Sundays, but a family emergency having intervened last week, this is going up now.

Ingredients

2 cups all purpose flour

2 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. cinnamon

½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. vanilla

2 cups sugar

¾ cups vegetable oil

1 cup plain yogurt

4 large eggs

2 cups shredded zucchini

1Tbsp grated orange zest

Glaze

½ cup orange juice

½ cup brown sugar

½ cup bourbon

Directions

1. preheat oven to 350
2. in a bowl, whisk together first five dry ingredients
3. With electric mixer, blend next four moist ingredients
4. Beat in eggs one at a time
5. Add dry ingredient mix and beat until combined
6. Stir in zucchini and zest and pour into greased pan
7. Bake 40-45 minutes or until tester comes out clean
8. Cool 5 minutes. Pierce cake and pour glaze over it. Chill overnight.