Red and yellow onions were taking over my kitchen counter last week, and something had to be done.
So I caramelized a big batch of them, and now I have lots of carmelized onion delicious-ness. Think about the possibilities here. Pizza. Pasta. Soup. Risotto. Quesadillas. Omelets. With goat cheese and herbs, baked into a savory tart!
The first necessary step was peeling and slicing all those onions into rings. Then pouring a few glugs of olive oil and piling those onion rings into a pan.
I don't know if you can tell, but that is a big pan of onions. It's a 12" wide deep-fry pan, so it has deep sides. Note the pot of white beans bubbling away on the back of the stove.
Now all that's necessary is long, slow, and gentle cooking over a low flame. No lid! We want the onions to caramelize, not steam. Poke at them and turn them around every so often with a wooden spoon or tongs, but find something else to do, too. These onions will take their sweet time, here.
The onions are done once they have turned a delicious caramel-ly brown color and are so sweet that they practically melt in your mouth. This might take 45 minutes to an hour, or more.
Remember the white beans on the back of the stove? They were delicious topped with the caramelized onions, along with oven-roasted tomatoes and fresh rosemary.
I wonder if onions can be caramelized in the slow cooker? The idea inspires the lazy cook inside me.
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