Julia Child with a Dash of Jenny!

Tonight I was checking Facebook and I received a message from my friend Jenny.  I've know Jenny for about a year now.  She and her husband, Jeremy, are fellow geocachers!  If you'd like to learn more about geocaching, click on the link!  I also have a geocaching blog, as do Jenny and Jeremy.  (Shameless plug, I know.)  Anyways, Jenny had a wonderful new recipe to share!  I can't wait to make this!  Enjoy~

 

 Here's a picture of Jenny and Jeremy with their 1,000th geocache find!

This last weekend, I had Outback Steakhouse's French Onion Soup. It was delicious, as usual. But I couldn't get the taste out of my mouth, so I began to hunt for recipes. Low and behold, I come across Julia Child's full-proof and simple recipe for the soup. Here's the recipe and I highly recommend it to anyone who loves a good, hearty soup any time of the year.

 French Onion Soup
¼ cup olive oil
2 tablespoons butter
2 cloves garlic, pressed
3 lbs onions, thinly sliced
2 cups dry white wine
1 teaspoon white sugar
8 cups beef broth
6 slices Provolone cheese
12 toasted French baguette slices or Texas Toast, flavored croutons
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Preparation:

Melt the oil and butter in a big pan over a medium heat, and then add the sugar, garlic, and onions. Sauté until they are slightly colored for about 6 minutes. Add the white wine and bring the mixture to a boil. Turn the temperature back down to medium and cook for 5 minutes, then pour in the broth.

Turn the temperature up to medium high, and then back to low.

Let the onion soup simmer for 90 minutes, uncovered.

You can freeze the soup at this point if you like.

Preheat the oven to 400. Put a couple of slices of toasted bread on each one, and then sprinkle the cheese over the top. Put the soup bowls on a shallow baking pan and bake until the cheese melts.

This will take about a minute.

(Serves 6)

*I served it with grilled cheese sandwiches, filled with Thousand Island dressing and Swiss Cheese - kind of a play on the Reuben minus the meat, but meat could be added easily.

*Season with salt AFTER it has simmered for 90 minutes and taste to see if it is salty enough. Keep in mind the cheese and croutons add a lot of salt to it, too.

*I also added about a 1/4 cup port wine to add some depth of the beef broth, this seemed to help a lot. I would highly recommend keeping the white wine as the base, though and not flip-flopping the red for white.

I hope you enjoy this recipe as much as we did! It's definitely going to be a stand-by meal from now on at our house!