The truth on caramelized onions...and the lies contained in lots of recipes...except for Richard's

So happy you brought that up...it is one of my pet peeves to read in a recipe

to caramelize onions in 5 to 19 minutes. Never happen! Why do they do that?

 
Some people want to live in a Rachel Ray world. If the recipe stated

that one step was going to take 30-60 minutes they wouldn't bother with it.

 
Yeah, I have sympathy for the cooks without enough experience to see the...

...problem ahead of time and allow for the extra time we all know it takes.

I never use sugar. It burns too fast and makes the onions icky-sweet, IMHO.

SALT is the only "quickener" I know of that works. A bit of kosher salt draws the moisture out of the onions and speeds up the process a bit. I compensate for the addition of salt by backing off elsewhere in the recipe.

Slow. Food. Rocks.

Michael

 
And except for Julia's recipes. I make her French Onion Soup every year

And her recipes always work because she always had a legion of testers and recipes were worked on until they just plain work every time. Today people just rush out cookbooks and recipes without the work needed and it leaves mostly inexperienced cooks in the lurch. They try a recipe that "sounds good" but it doesn't work in their kitchen.

Julia's French Onion Soup is a true labor of love- there are two labor of love steps in it: one is roasting bones and veggies in preparation of making the stock and the other is caramelizing the onions. I always double the recipe so I start with at least 12 cups of thinly sliced onions in a huge pot. It takes a good hour.

 
Thank you Michael. I always thought it was me missing something that made it take so long...

I thought "there must be some trick I am missing" many times. Being self taught, there's a lot of tricks of which I am ignorant.

So how do you make them in a crock pot?

 
Exactly. A beginning cook will think they are doing something wrong if the onions don't brown

within the specified time, get frustrated, and then not want to try again.

I also hate it when recipes specify a time frame like "Active Prep Time 5 minutes. Cook time 47 minutes. Total time 52 minutes."

Yeah, right. If all the ingredients are at the ready and you know where all your knives and pans are and your phone is turned off.

 
How to caramelize onions in a crockpot? WOW there are lots of opinions on Google!

9-18 hours
3 hours on high then 10 hours on low
10 hours on low then 3 hours on high with lid cracked
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 stick butter, 2 tablespoons oil, salt & pepper, Balsamic vinegar
1 stick margarine (WTF is that?)

One person mentioned he gave the convenience an A but flavor a B because "I think that you lose something by caramelizing the onions in ceramic over low heat vs. a skillet; the contact of the onions with the hot surface of the skillet seems to my taste buds to sear in a richer, sweeter flavor, whereas the crockpot-cooked onions had a slightly washed-out flavor. "

 
I would agree with that although I have never done onions in a slow-cooker

but I think generally some things I make in there for convenience would be better in a heavy pot in the oven.

 
I have done it in the crock pot and blogged it - it took about 10 hours but it was passive

time, also the onions help up their structure more than cooked on the stove or in the oven, like CI does for their "improved French onion soup recipe".

I wasn't sure I liked the intact texture but found when I strew them across a flat bread or sauteed in butter briefly to reheat (I froze them into little bundles) they tasted and felt great.

http://heatherinsf.wordpress.com/2012/02/18/hands-off-caramelized-onions/

 
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