Easy French Onion Soup Recipe (2024)

FAQs

How do you deepen the flavor of French onion soup? ›

My personal go-tos include worcestershire sauce, fish sauce, and brandy. Each deepens the flavor of french onion soup. Balsamic vinegar and soy sauce are other great options.

The easiest way to thicken your French onion soup is with flour. You can also use cornstarch if you don't have any flour. Remember to never add the flour or cornstarch directly to the soup – otherwise you run the risk of it clumping.

Best Broth for French Onion Soup

Take your pick; they're all good. Next comes the stock, which is the second most important component of the soup. Traditionally, the stock of choice for French onion soup is beef stock, but beef stock is very time-consuming to make at home.

The caramelized onions for this soup cook more quickly due to a pinch of baking soda but still have that deep, slow-cooked flavor. Topping the soup with hot, cheesy toasts prepared while the soup simmers, eliminates the need to bake the soup in specialty French onion soup bowls.

"If your broth is lacking in savory richness, try adding roasted onion, tomato paste, mushrooms, seaweed, soy sauce, or miso. These ingredients add umami flavor and depth to broth," she says.

Herbs and sources add flavor, aroma, and intensity to the soup broth. You can pick fresh or dried herbs like basil for tomato-based soups or fresh parsley for clear broths. You may also add more spices like turmeric, ground ginger, ground paprika, or nutmeg for a touch of spice and color to your soup broth.

What is the Difference Between Onion Soup and French Onion Soup? French onion soup is always made with beef stock. Other onion soups can be made with chicken, vegetable, or beef stock. Additionally, French onion soup typically contains wine or sherry, which isn't typical or necessary in other onion soups.

It is better to use chicken or vegetable broth rather than sub-standard beef broth. Best to use low salt and add salt if required. 4. Bread - The idea with the recipe is that you can use a spoon to cut through the bread into the soup to eat it (see video).

Flour: a little all-purpose flour will help to thicken the soup. You can feel free to use gluten-free flour. Dry white wine: this helps to deglaze the pan and add a boost of flavor.

That said, French onion soup's other key ingredients are beef broth and gruyere cheese, which accounts for its utterly decadent and robust balance of sweet, creamy, and umami. For umami-rich beef dishes and ultra-creamy cheeses, red wine's complexity, fruitiness, and bitter finish are the optimal choices.

What broth is French onion soup made of? ›

This soup traditionally is made with beef stock, though sometimes a good beef stock can be hard to come by and expensive to make. If you use boxed stock, taste it first! If you don't like the taste, don't use it. (If you cook a lot of beef or beef roasts, save the scraps and freeze them to make a stock with later.)

Burned onions – result in bitter soup. Be careful to not burn the onions/cook them until they are too dark in color – you don't really need to cook them until they are dark brown – golden brown/light brown is enough.

But as the publication explains, lemon juice adds more than just tartness. For chicken soup in particular, lemon juice balances out the more rich and savory flavors, adding an overall brightness to the taste.

Lemons are a chicken soup game changer. Why? They brighten up and balance the salty, rich flavors of the dish, and make all of the ingredients come into line.

The key to good French onion soup is to cook the onions so long that they threaten to melt into a viscous, dark brown paste, à la Marmite. As has already been extensively reported in Slate, there are no shortcuts when you're caramelizing onions; it always takes at least an hour, usually longer.

Infusing the soup with a richer taste is as easy as quickly sauteing crushed garlic before pouring the soup in. Some soft, buttery garlic sauteed in earthy olive oil is the perfect addition to enrich canned French onion soup.

Use fresh vegetables, high-quality meats or broth, and fresh herbs to add depth of flavor. Add acidity: A squeeze of lemon or lime juice, a dash of vinegar, or a splash of wine can brighten the flavors of a soup and make it taste more complex.

A squeeze of citrus, a dollop of yogurt or a drizzle of cream, a dusting of cheese or a good chile powder, a sprinkling of some herbs or croutons — all can take a perfectly fine soup into the realm of the delectable. Even a spiral of good olive oil to finish and some coarse sea salt can do wonders.