It’s a 2-day business, his making of the soup, so he doesn’t do it all that often. That just adds to its specialness, because I completely love it and if I had my way, I’d eat it every week. It isn’t difficult, it’s just a multi-stage process and requires long periods of waiting. I recommend making a great dessert in the waiting period, and watching a movie.
Start with a huge bunch of marrow bones – roast them until they’re golden brown.
Put the roasted bones in a big pot …
…and cover with water. Simmer 10 hours or more.
Remove the bones and chill the stock. If it’s good and cold, it’s easy to lift off the layer of fat.
Get a pile of gorgeous yellow onions.
Slice them thinly — a food processor makes it fast and easy.
Sautee the onions in butter until they’re rich and brown and well caramelized:
Make the croutons: Slice a loaf of bread (French bread is good). Dry it out a little bit in a low oven, and then brush the slices generously with melted butter, on both sides. Return them to the oven and cook until golden brown.
Get out your oven-proof soup bowls.
Ladle in the (room temperature) soup, leaving room for croutons and cheese.
Fit croutons in on top of the soup. Break off corners of pieces to completely cover the soup.
Next, a thick layer of aged Swiss gruyere, shredded.
Bake in a very hot oven until the cheese is browned and bubbly.
Gaze in wonder and delight at the gorgeous, gorgeous soup.
ENJOY. I always swoon a little bit.
your french onion soup is totally droolworthy! Btw, where did you get the soup bowls?
Thanks, Mandy! We got them at Zabar’s, in NYC. They’re really perfect for this soup; I don’t think we use them for anything else.
We’re glad you visited our site.
I just stumbled across your blog and you had me at “marrow bones”.
OMG! That soup is amazing I think French Onion soup has to be my favorite hands down. The beefy stock, caramelized onion, croutons and the cheese I love the cheese. It all to die for! Very nice!
Thanks Heather and Chuck! Any soup that involves marrow bones is going to be good, and when cheese is involved? Forget about it. It’s really a wonderful soup. Thanks for visiting!
Thanks for visiting my blog! Your french onion soup looks soooo good! I love soup like this!
That French onion soup looks amazing!!
Truly a beautiful soup!
looks beautiful! i bought soup bowls two months ago and still haven’t used them … warm weather be darned, after seeing these drool-worthy photos, i think i might still have to!
yum!
where does one get a bunch of marrow bones like that in the city?
To my horror the price of marrow bones is often as much as ground beef. I seem to remember you could get them for free 20 years ago. I generally talk to the butcher in a large supermarket at Fairway and see if I can negotiate better price if I start off stating I want 15 or 20 lbs. Good luck.
I am making this tonight for dinner tomorrow (made the stock last night, though not with beef marrow bones—the cheapest bones I could find were lamb bones!)
Will I regret not having the oven-safe bowls? I was thinking I would just float the croutons and cheese on the top of my dutch oven full of soup, and then we’d scoop out individual portions.