French Onion Sandwich?

From the New York Times recipe pages comes the sandwich version of one of our favorite soups: French Onion. We met in French class, but that is probably not why we like it so much. Could be the cheesy salty sweetness of it. And although we make a lot of complicated soups, our go-to in this category is the frozen blocks from Trader Joe's that transform magically into a layered soup in the oven.

Pam mentioned this recipe when we noticed the Gruyère I had purchased at the very same store --- a cheese introduced to us years ago by the lovely couple from whom we rented our first home in Bridgewater. Since Trader Joe's is a schlepp from here, they would ask us to pick up a package whenever they knew we were headed there.

The recipe is quite simple; it requires a bit of patience but no complicated technique. I sliced a few onions as thinly as I could, and cooked them on medium-high heat, covered for a few minutes. The key was then to lower the heat, uncover, and cook for 20-25 minutes more. For the first half of this, an occasional stir was needed. For the last several minutes, more frequent stirring and steady lowering of the heat was helpful. The result was a darkening, sweetening, and roughly 50 percent reduction in the onions:

Notice I used our enamel pan with a silicone spatula. I would normally use our indispensable cast-iron skillet for this kind of thing, but as he onions got jammier, I was glad to have these tools, to get every smidgeon out and not leave a mess.

I then shredded the cheese -- more than the 4 ounces suggested, as I always do -- and mixed it in a bowl with the caramelized onion. The result was not pretty, so I was pleasantly surprised when my photo of the final result turned out better than the photo posted by NYT on the recipe page. The golden-hour setting sun at our beach house was responsible for that, I think.

Lagniappe

It was a Gruyère purchase that got us into this meal, but right before I started, I noticed that I had only seen Gruyère at TJs, but that I had picked up some fancy cheddar instead. This will be a good excuse to make these again soon. I will also have mustard in some form for dipping, as both the recipe and one of my friends suggest. So it will be EVEN MORE BETTER.