The "He's Gone" Chronicles: Tasty Edition Pt.2 - French Onion Soup

French Onion Soup is probably my favorite soup, right next to chicken noodle, tomato, potato, and whatever soup they serve at those hibachi restaurants.

I have attempted two soups in my life: Potato Soup (which was amazing) and Onion Soup (which was a complete and utter disaster. Tasted like dirt and grass soup). So, I'm currently 1-1 with soups.

This is the TASTY video I saved on Facebook for French Onion Soup.

I sort of followed these instructions, but I wanted it to be very delicious and also very easy and, for some reason, I started this while feeling very pretentious about the quality of the soup and didn't see some things in this particular recipe that I was sure should be included. So, I did a little research and combined a few recipes to make my own inclusive version. Mostly one that included Gruyere. What is this Swiss and Parmesan nonsense?!?

It turned out pretty flipping amazing actually. I just had my first bite. I think I picked up a cold from one of the children I work with, and I am certain this soup will heal my soul.

The Finished Decadence artfully displayed on coaster on paper plate.

FRENCH ONION SOUP

• 2 large sweet onions
• 4 tbsp butter
• salt (to taste)
• pepper (to taste)
• 1/2 tsp sugar
• apple cider vinegar (like, 1/8 c? I had a little in the bottom of a bottle)
• worchestershire (however much you deem appropriate)
• 1/2 tsp ground sage
• garlic (I used about 4-5 cloves, you can use however much you want, or none)
• 6 cups beef broth
• 1 bay leaf
• white wine (I used 2 miniature Sutter Home Pinot Grigio, enough to cover the onions)
• cognac (I used 1 miniature Hennesey VS)
• a baguette cut in little rounds
• GRUYERE cheese (about 8 oz. shredded)

As you can see, my ingredients varied from what was in the video, but not by much. Also, I did not use a ceramic soup bowl or any little ramekins. I made do with what I had, like a true middle class American.

WHAT I DID:

I used a deep stainless steel skillet the whole time. It was perfect.

Step 1: Cook the onions.

I melted the butter and then threw in 6 cups of these bad boys. I moved them around a lot in the beginning until they were all covered in butter because I didn't want to stress about them. Then I had to leave them alone. That was hard for me until I realized I forgot to get wine and cognac. Because I had to go and get those, not watching the onions became easier. I left them on low and headed out.

When I came back, they looked like this. Perfect.

Easily the #1 MVP of this recipe besides the cognac

I let them get a little more brown and then I poured in the wine. I let that reduce until it was a bit sticky and then I added all the beef broth, the bay leaf, the ground sage, some more salt, and then I played around with the rest (worchestershire, apple cider vinegar, pepper, salt) until it tasted appropriate. I eyeballed the worchestershire and just added what I had left in a bottle for the apple cider vinegar. It really didn't need a lot... or any, if you're not into that.

Starting to look like a real French Onion Soup

I let it sit in there for about ten minutes simmering and covered until I thought about it and decided I wanted some garlic flavor in there. I haphazardly minced up about 4-5 cloves and then threw them in to stew as well.

I also remembered the cognac at about this point and had to open the bottle with my teeth in order to get it in the soup.

I had some garlic bits left on the cutting board, so I added those on top of the baguette rounds I had already sliced up and covered in olive oil. It turned out okay. The garlic got a bit browner than I would have liked, but I was also rushing it at the end and turned the oven temp up from 325 to 350 and wasn't paying very close attention. I cooked them appx. 10 minutes on each side. To be fair, I think it was 12 on one side and about 6 on the other. Like I said, hungry.

While the baguette rounds were crisping up, I just left the soup up top to simmer and combine. I occasionally removed the lid to taste it because I was getting so very hungry and impatient at this point. I decided to forgo any of this "baking the soup" in the oven until I had it in a bowl.

You can see the extra brown garlic on top. Oops. It still tasted fine though. No burned flavors.

I threw about three of those baguette pieces in the top of a ceramic bowl and hoped that it was "oven safe." I took the Gruyere cheese I grated while I was waiting on the baguette pieces and smooshed it on top until it covered everything. Then, I threw it all back in the oven to melt.

Gruyere: Swiss' elegant and perfect cousin.

Directions said to bake it at 350 for about 30 minutes, but about 2 minutes into that time frame I decided it was impossible to wait that long and switched on the broiler to melt the cheese faster.

Impatiently peeking at the progress with my mouth watering and fingers crossed.

I pulled it out as soon as the cheese began to have the hint of brown. If I was less hungry, I would have left it in a few minutes more. But, I decided this was good enough.

Heaven in a bowl.

I've got to admit,  I was surprised it was as good as it was. It turned out heavenly.

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FRENCH ONION SOUP GRADING

Time Involved (Prep): A
Time Involved (Cooking): B-
Ease of Recipe Ingredients: A-
Dishes Involved: A-
Flavor: A+
Satisfaction: A+

The onions were the most difficult part of this recipe and they weren't even really difficult, just time consuming. I think I could have dealt with the onions taking so long if I didn't feel compelled to babysit them. Maybe if I make it a few more times, I can just feel confident they will be alright and go do other things. I did start this around 6:30 pm and was eating at 8 pm, so it wasn't terrible, it just felt long.
_________________________________________________________________________________

Anyway, time to eat and cuddle my cat and watch the Olympics. Thank goodness for the Olympics.

I Can Take Care of Myself

S and I always have a little heart to heart before he leaves about what to do in case of X, Y, and Z. Sometimes it's silly, but mostly it's not. What to do in case of a flat tire, who to call in case of emergency, what to do if I somehow find myself downtown at night in an uncomfortable or dangerous situation... and so on. 

So I like to let him know when I have truly done something on my own that I would normally have done for me by someone else.

Like last night.

It's so fat and gross.

Now, normally, I would remain perched in a high place of not-anywhere-near-the-bug. But, I decided not to ignore it in the hallway and DO SOMETHING BRAVE AND INDEPENDENT. So I trapped it under a glass and sent a picture of it to S with the caption, "I told you I can take care of myself."

It was a very proud moment.

Until today, when I got home from work and kicked over the glass I had left on the floor (because I didn't want to kill the spider and also it was late and I was not feeling like carrying or throwing it anywhere in the dark). 

I shattered the glass, thereby releasing the fat spider into the hallway, and promptly noticed lots of dust floating around on the ground. Except it was spiders. Lots of baby spiders. 

Motherfucker gave birth to spiders after I trapped it in the glass. Or I induced labor by giving it a fright when I kicked it into the hallway.

Either way, they were scattering everywhere, so I quick grabbed another PLASTIC cup and expertly placed it over top of the motherspider to trap any remaining babies as well. I grabbed a paper towel and squished all the ones crawling away. It took a few seconds too many to find something to squish them with. I knew in the back of my mind it had to be something I would be able to throw away, but this morning was trash day, so all my would-be-useful trash was outside in the bin.

I can just imagine how many spiders are in there now.

Problem solved.

So now there is a plastic cup sitting in the hallway that has lots of spiders in it and I'm going to leave it there to go make a sandwich. I've had enough spider for the afternoon, and I feel like I cannot deal with this development appropriately at the moment. I almost knocked myself out grabbing the broom to sweep up all the glass.

Hopefully, I killed all the baby spiders I didn't trap with the cup. And hopefully. I don't kick over the cup again before I can figure out what to do with it.

What do you guys do about the problems you don't normally solve by yourself? Also, does anyone recognize what kind of spider this is?

The "He's Gone" Chronicles: Tasty Edition Pt. 1

He's gone... and I'm sooooo bored.

Since he'll be gone this time for a month, I'm desperate to avoid being bored for an entire month.

Last time he left, I developed feelings for the Netflix and Amazon Prime accounts, so I'm trying something a little different this time with more productive outcomes. Probably.

As everyone is aware, TASTY produces very consumable and "likable" recipe gifs. I'm addicted. I have saved a ton of them from Facebook and decided to do a sort of lazy Julia Childs Challenge and cook my way through all my saved TASTY video recipes while he's gone.

**WARNING: This challenge I have given myself is heavily accompanied by a mild workout regimen consisting of sometimes running if it's not too hot or humid outside and my own swim workouts at the pool as well as a healthy helping of working with groups of children three times a week. I recommend doing at least this much physical activity or, better yet, more than I am currently doing, in order to not have this become a month of completely slumming it. Just FYI, if you were feeling similarly inspired.**

The Current List In No Particular Order:

• Cornflake Chicken Nuggets
• Almond Meringue Peaches
• Bloomin' Onion (classic)
• Spatchcock Grilled Chicken
• Cream Cheese Banana Bread Muffins
• French Onion Soup
• Pecan Pie Cheesecake
• Poached Shrimp and Orzo
• Mojito Marinated Chicken
• Spicy Tomato Coconut Chicken
• Wings (I can't call them "Buffalo" Wings because he thinks "Buffalo" is a boring flavor)
• Stuffed Steak Rolls
• Beef Dumplings
• Creme Brulee
• Pork Cutlet Sliders
• Old Fashioned Donuts
• Creamy Lemon Butter Chicken

So this should be fun. I'll at least feel justified for saving all these videos on Facebook. And, hopefully, this will occupy some mindspace that is normally just taken over with moping when he's gone.

What do you guys do to stay sane when yours is gone?