French Onion Soup

By minicoopercraig

We're not going to lie: Good French onion soup takes time. But it takes almost no true effort, other than fighting back the tears as you chop your way through the five onions. And wouldn't you rather deal with a few errant tears than with a lackluster, overpriced bowl of soup that packs as much saturated fat as 20 strips of bacon and more sodium than nine bags of Lay's potato chips? Not that's a real reason to cry.

Ingredients

• 1 Tbsp butter
• 5 medium onions (a mix of yellow and red is ideal), sliced
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 bay leaves
• 6 cups low-sodium beef broth
• 1/2 cup dry red wine
• 4 or 5 sprigs fresh thyme (optional)
• Freshly cracked black pepper
• 4 slices of baguette or sourdough bread
• 1/2 cup shredded Swiss cheese

Details

Servings 4

Preparation

Step 1

Heat the butter in a large pot over low heat. Add the onions and salt. Cover the pot and cook the onions over low heat until very soft and caramelizes, about 30 minutes. (Most of this is unsupervised. Check on the onions every 10 minutes or so and stir.)
Add the bay leaves, broth, wine and thyme (if using). Simmer on low heat for at least 15 minutes. Season with pepper. Discard the bay leaves.
Preheat the broiler. Divide the soup among 4 oven-proof bowls. Top each with a slice of baguette and some cheese. Broil until the cheese is melted and bubbling, about 3 minutes.