French Onion Soup

Yet another soup I really like for cold winter days. It’s extremely simple, and if you give it enough time it’s wonderful!
Last time I made it I used leek (‘kresha’ in Hebrew) instead of onions and it turned out to be maybe even better.

Ingredients:

• 4-8 Onions depending on their size. Could be replaced by the same quantity of leeks
• 50gr. Yellow butter
• 2 soup spoons of white wheat
• 1 liter of Chicken Bouillon
• 1/2 cup white wine
• 1/4 cup Brandy
• Salt, peper, Chili powder

Directions:

• Cut the onions in stripes. I simply cut them in half and then cut each half in thin slices.
• Fry the onions in the butter, using a high cooking pan. Make sure you keep the fire LOW! It should fry for around an hour, maybe even more, and still not burn. Keep stirring once in a while. You must continue frying until the onions are almost completely melted, transparent, with a slight yellow tint (not burned!). Most of the time I leave it on the fire with closed top (except for when I stir, obviously…).
• Add the wheat and stir thoroughly. Let them fry with the wheat for 1-2 minutes. You must keep stirring otherwise the wheat will burn.
• Add the bouillon and the wine. I usually warm the bouillon up beforehand, but it’s not a must. If you don’t have enough liquid to cover all the onions, you can complement with warm water (or more bouillon). Turn the fire up until it boils.
• Lower the fire and keep it at boiling temperature for another ½ hour (sometimes a little more). Make sure you continue to stir once in a while; otherwise the onions get stuck on the bottom and… burn.
• Add the Chili powder, salt and pepper – according to your taste
• Stir and leave on the fire for a couple of minutes
• Take off the fire and add the brandy, stir
• Mission accomplished

Side note: Chili powder is not something you’ll see often in an onion soup. I tried it once, and found it adds a special taste to the soup, makes it interesting. It also gives it a nice orange-red color (that is not due to over-burning the onions). I’ve never made an onion soup without it since then!