This Is How Thick Your Onion Slices Should Be For The Perfect French Onion Soup

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For a hearty soup to take you through the cold months, nothing beats a French onion soup. It's an amazing balance of salty and umami, with a little bit of bitter and sweet. If you haven't made it before, the perfect onion variety is probably yellow for your French onion soup — it's starchier and cooks down beautifully. And you might want to try Comté cheese in your French onion soup because it browns perfectly, and will offer some extra funky flavor.

But when you're cooking French onion soup, how should you cut the onions? There might be some mistakes keeping you from perfect French onion soup. If you cut them vertically, where you're cutting toward the root end, rather than horizontally, you will break fewer vegetal cells and have less of a physical (crying) reaction. And you want to cut about ¼ inch pieces. We call this pole to pole — from the top of the onion to the bottom (green to root). You'll need to remove the root section, of course, and peel a layer off the exterior, but then you're ready to go with your onions.

Make sure your knife is good and sharp. It will save the tears as you slice and ensure you get perfect slices every time. You definitely need to properly caramelize the onions. They should be stirred constantly to ensure that they're cooking evenly. Use some butter and cook them over medium heat in a frying pan until translucent.

Beef bouillon is the way to go for French onion soup, and Better Than Bouillon Beef Base will give you some solid flavor, but a chicken stock can work, if that's what you have at home. Try some diced shallots for more aromatic intensity. Once your onions are cooked, you'll want to add beef broth with a little salt and pepper, maybe some sherry vinegar, and let it simmer for about 30 minutes. From there, you'll want to put the soup in oven-safe bowls and add some bread or croutons on top, and top that with cheese. Then broil the bowls in the oven until the cheese is browned. It will come out crispy on top with perfectly browned, unctuous onions, and a bit of a gooey spread from the cheese.