Badische Zwiebelsuppe

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Wide heavy soup pot or Dutch oven
• •Sharp knife or mandoline
• •Ovenproof soup bowls

Instructions

1. 1

   Slice the onions

   Halve the onions through the root, peel them, and slice them thinly from stem to root so the pieces cook evenly. Even slices soften at the same pace; thick pieces stay sharp while thin ones burn, and then the soup tastes confused before the broth even goes in.

2. 2

   Sweat them slowly

   Melt the butter with the oil in a wide heavy pot over medium-low heat, then add the onions, salt, and sugar. Cook 30 to 40 minutes, stirring often, until the onions collapse, turn pale gold to deep gold, and smell sweet. Runter mit der Temperatur if the edges darken too fast. The onions must lose water before they take colour, or you get bitterness instead of depth.

   Use a wide pot, not a narrow saucepan. Crowded onions trap too much moisture and boil in their own juice, which delays browning and dulls the flavour.
3. 3

   Flour and wine

   Stir in the garlic for one minute, just until it smells round and not raw, then dust in the flour and cook it for two minutes. The flour needs a short cook or it tastes pasty. Pour in the white wine and scrape the bottom hard, because the browned onion stuck there is the part you already paid for with time.

4. 4

   Simmer the broth

   Add the broth, bay leaf, thyme, and black pepper. Bring it just to a lively simmer, then lower the heat and cook uncovered for 20 minutes so the onion sweetness, wine, and broth settle into one soup. Boiling hard makes the broth cloudy and drives off the clean wine note Baden needs.

5. 5

   Toast the bread

   While the soup simmers, toast the bread until it is dry and firm all the way through. A soft slice sinks and turns to paste; a dry toast drinks broth at the edges and still gives you something to bite.

6. 6

   Gratin and serve

   Taste the soup, then salt only at the end because broth and cheese bring their own salt. Ladle into ovenproof bowls, set one toast on each, cover with grated cheese, and grill until the cheese is melted and spotted gold. Finish with chives if you use them. Würzen, Fett, Salz zum Schluss. Schön ist, was schmeckt.

Chef Tips

• •Choose plain yellow onions. Red onions make the soup muddy, and sweet onions can turn flat once the wine goes in.
• •Use a dry Baden white wine you would drink with supper. Gutedel keeps it lean, Silvaner is rounder, dry Riesling brings more edge. Sweet wine turns the bowl clumsy.
• •If you have onion skins, parsley stems, celery ends, or a chicken carcass, put them toward the broth. Weggeworfen wird nichts, and this soup shows it.
• •The cheese is a finish, not the dish. Gruyere is the Rhine-neighbour choice; Bergkäse or Emmentaler keeps it on the German side without turning the bowl heavy.

Advance Preparation

• •The onions can be cooked through the golden stage one day ahead and chilled. Rewarm them gently before adding wine and broth, because cold onions thrown into liquid give up less flavour.
• •The finished soup keeps 3 days in the refrigerator without the bread and cheese. Add the toast and cheese only when serving, or the bread collapses and the good work goes soft.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 520g)