French Onion Soup Grilled Cheese Sandwiches

Did you read that title and immediately think “uh...?” while salivating a bit? Because that was basically my reaction when I found out about these sandwiches. We are very pro-grilled cheese in this house so any and all twists are welcomed! There are quite a number of recipes out there for this particular sandwich but it's so simple, you really don't need one.


Take just about everything you'd use to make french onion soup but rearrange things a bit. Caramelize two medium onions in butter and oil, sugar, thyme, and white wine or broth, grate some delicious Swiss gruyère, spread lots o' butter on thick slices of a baguette or, in my case, sourdough and boom, you're in business!


I went to town on these onions but that's because we love super-caramelized onions. Keep an eye on them if you're not too keen on them becoming too brown, you don't want to end up with burned onions!


After letting your bread soak up a good amount of butter, top with the onions and grated cheese. Grating the cheese will help with the melting process, so don't skip that step! It will result in an amazingly gooey sandwich.


I combined and modified these two recipes from Tasty Kitchen and Portuguese Girl Cooks to come up with the above. I strongly suggest you make these. STRONGLY!

A Not-So-Brief Hiatus

Wow! A full month since my last post... I'm not totally sure, but I don't think that's how you blog? There was a trip to New York (finally!), then I got sick, plus holiday (giftmas) planning. It's safe to say I lost track of time and I've yet to finish my cat face sweater. So, instead of a post dedicated to my shortcomings in the craft department, I'll share some more food I've made recently.


Thanks to one of my favorite sweethearts of the internet, Dorothy, I found this great garlic knot recipe. To accompany the knots, I decided fettuccine Alfredo would be perfect since it's so damn simple. Just throw together equal parts Parmesan, cream, and butter. Just kidding! But only a little...


The recipe makes a simple pizza dough which can totally be subbed by store-bought stuff. Though the dough had to rise for over an hour (90 mins), as all pizza dough does, the process moved along fairly quickly.

The fact that they were absolutely adorable certainly helped.

Once they were all done and slathered in garlicky, buttery goodness, we could not resist! It took us all of three days to eat just over 20. Oh, and the fettuccine Alfredo was good, too. Adding a bit of lemon juice and zest took it above and beyond. A+.

I AM AMAZING

No, really. I am. Want proof?
BOOM
Andrew and I woke up feeling the need to channel IKEA's Cookbook and Longman & Eagle for one reason or another. I think it worked out in everyone's best interest. Here's the evidence:


Crab Cake Bits


Garlic Potato Bits

Hollandaise Bits

Eggs Benedict Bits



And really, not to toot my own horn, BUT IT WAS FABULOUS. I absolutely love when each element of my meals is homemade (save for the mayonnaise + panko crumbs used for the crab cakes). At first I was pretty worried about the hollandaise sauce because I don't have a double boiler and I didn't want my yolks to curdle! but it turned out to be really simple. Next time I definitely plan to make my own english muffins, but I just baked a no-knead loaf so it made sense to use it.



Another awesome meal we made last week (other than all of them? ;P) was Jalapeño Popper Grilled Cheese Sandwiches:

SO delicious

I totally recommend you visit Closet Cooking! If you decide to make this sandwich I suggest you up the jalapeño count as well as add some extra cream cheese.

So, I feel the need to express how dire our kitchen situation was for, oh, about the last month?? We were literally down to condiments and frozen tater tots before we finally went to the grocery store. In celebration of finally having food, I made the world's largest batch of shakshuka but Andrew and I gobbled it down before he had a chance to take any photos. This week I'll be making pizza, pasta and pie! Cooking is fun again, yay :D

Slow Progress

This is what a single 3oz skein of Lion Brand yarn looks like when it's SC in the back loops for 137 Sts with a J hook. It would make a nice super stretchy scarf at this length, something I'll need to remember for Christmas :) I've never crocheted in the back loops before so it took some getting used to but I really like the stripe effect!
42" wide, 7" long & I've got 43" to go!
If you're using this pattern, I suggest buying an extra skein of yarn for safe measure. I really hope it fits. The pattern calls for 38" in length but I may make it 50" to be on the safe side. This is a perfect example why "one size fits most" makes no sense/I hate being an inbetweenie.

I've baked three loaves of no-knead bread this week! The first was actually my most beautiful to date and for some reason it held the highest rise. The other two deflated upon pouring into my cast iron pot. It makes me so sad every time that happens, though the last one turned out nice. Being the HUGE nerd that I am, I recorded the crackling sounds while it cooled. Imagine me in my apartment. It's 2am on a Friday night... everyone's asleep and this beauty starts singing to me... *crackle* *CRACKLE* *bread sounds* *crackle*

om nom nom

Slightly obsessed, kind of addicted...

The smell of fresh bread filling the apartment has become addictive. This past weekend I baked two loaves using bread flour and whole wheat flour instead of all-purpose. They were delicious but for some reason no where near the awesomeness of my first loaf.

Love the different shades
The whole wheat definitely had an earthy taste. I liked it but I think it would have done better with some honey mixed in and oats sprinkled on the crust. Maybe next time... Andrew came home from work the other day and told me his coworkers had been pining for his bread during lunch. Hah! Apparently now I'm taking bread orders? It's actually pretty awesome yet scary because I can't taste it before I give it away ;( I really hope it's good! Since I was making a loaf for other people, I decided what the hell and made another one for us. This time with cheddar mixed in. That's five whole loaves under my belt and I've blogged & tweeted about all of them. For this, I am sorry.


Thanks to this super easy recipe, I also made schiacciata last night! Even though it's supposed to be used for making sandwiches, it replaced the crust for our "pizza" tonight. With proper planning, I would have baked everything at once, toppings and all but whatevs. It was so light and airy and mmm. I never knew I'd love baking/bread making this much. Although, I HATE how hot it gets in the apartment when baking at 500° for hours. It is not fun. At all. Forgive the crappy iphone photo, all other cameras were out of commission.

Before & after resting for an hour!



mmmm
I used garlic, tomatoes, onions, yellow peppers, parmesan & mozzarella for toppings. It was kind of like a sicilian style pizza but without any sauce. Totally delicious. Andrew said when he was in Italy, they'd serve it sliced in half and pressed like a panino. That'll definitely be the plan next time I make it.

Being KNEAD-y

I've been kind of obsessed with bread this week. I think the sourdough we picked up from Dill Pickle Food Co-op is to blame. It was so amazing, I probably got it in my head that I could and should be making my own. I found an awesome pizza dough recipe that was SO easy I can't believe I hadn't tried it before. I topped it with grated parmesan, fresh mozzarella, shaved asparagus I'd tossed with a clove of garlic (minced) and red pepper flakes, scallions, a touch of truffle oil, squeeze of lemon AND eggs (I know, I put eggs on everything). Andrew & I died. One bite and it was over, pizza heaven. We don’t even own a pizza stone or pan, just used the back of two cookie sheets and it worked beautifully. Originally I'd planned to make one and share it but upon telling Andrew, he immediately informed me he'd be eating one entirely to himself. I'm so glad I made two! We had enough left over for lunch the next day :)

Even Princess couldn't resist


mmm...
I decided the next logical step would be to make a loaf. I don't have a stand mixer or a bread maker but apparently there's no need for 'em anyway! Thanks to Jim Lahey and The New York Times (way back in '06), I found this insanely simple recipe for no-knead bread. I'm a bit late to the game, oh about 4 years, but whatever... It still works and I can't believe I've made homemade pizza dough & a loaf of bread all in the same week!


Tastes surprisingly similar to sourdough!
I let it rise for an extra 6hrs, totaling a full 24hrs. It was hard to just let it sit and be patient but it was well worth the wait. I finally pulled it out of the dutch oven around 1am and allowed it to cool overnight. The moment the 7:15 alarm went off, we jumped out of bed & started slicing, not so much as a "good morning" was uttered between us.

Tonight is the opening night for category 5 racing (beginners) and I'll be watching alone because Andrew is participating!! I'm so freggin' excited I can't even stand it. I really hope it doesn't get rained out ;(