Summer is finally here. There I said it. It’s hot, humid, did I mention humid? But don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to complain because the summer just took too damn long to arrive, so BRING IT. What I will complain about unbashedly is our transit system. I had the misfortune to ride the 504 King the other day in the heat of rush hour and it was B-R-U-T-A-L. Although it is the twenty-first century and we don’t live in a third world country, for some reason our street cars still don’t have A/C. Oh yes, the windows do open, but there is not a lot of air coming in when you are sitting in traffic or moving slower than the pedestrians on the side walks. So I got out and walked to the Metro (Subway) because I had somewhere really important to go, yes I was meeting someone ;-)!
About a month or so ago, I had extended the Blogger Girls Night Out invitation to Norma (From Garden to Wok) a very dear blogger friend, but unfortunately she was unable to make it up from Upstate New York. We were both rather disappointed so when she decided to make the trip to visit her sister in early July, she emailed me to see if we could meet. Of course, I was all over it, but work was busy and I wasn’t able to confirm until a day or two before but she was patient and waited as I finally finished what needed to be done and made the commitment. We had tried to include my old friend Barb (Profiteroles and Ponytails) but sadly she had a commitment and was not able to join us but rest assured, she was missed.
I met Norma a few years ago and to be honest, I can’t recall how I came across her blog or whether she left her lovely words on my blog first, but the point is that we’ve known each other in the blogging circles for a couple of years. Norma writes a beautiful blog documenting her escapades in her garden in which she grows a number of beautiful flowering plants and vegetables for the wild life in her area (well, she doesn’t really grow them specifically for the wild life, they just help themselves). Every Monday Norma posts her harvest from that week and it’s really cool to see the variety of vegetables she is able to grow, but then again she is a Master Gardener! Norma also blogs about recipes she makes with her home grown vegetables, giving us handy tricks and tips along the way. Norma is an accomplished food writer, having published two cookbooks as well as running cooking classes in her home town. I’ve made several (this and this) of Norma’s lovely recipes and would encourage you to visit her blog and write some lovely words for her.
Because we were both at opposite ends of Toronto, we picked a central location right at Bay and Bloor at La Societé a trendy French Bistro in the hoity toity area of Yorkville. We talked and talked and talked, honestly — the waiter was so sweet, he came over a number of times and finally said, very politely that he would stand over there and when we wanted something we should give him a nod. We talked for 3 hours straight — we ate too, but completely forgot to take photos! The conversation was lovely and we truly enjoyed each other’s company, just like old friends. Thank you Norma for a wonderful evening and we will see you again, perhaps even in Upstate New York.
Speaking of old friends, on a recent Sunday we had an old collegue friend and his wife over for brunch; I’ve known Gordon for 27 years. We met standing at a window in one of the sky scrapers downtown where we both worked, watching as the snow fell upwards! How could you not chat about that? Gordon and I became fast friends and had lunches from time to time catching up on life, then a handful of years ago we started seeing each other as couples and it’s been lovely — I knew that his wife Angela and I would become fast friends and that JT would get on with the similarly tempered Gordon and I was right, of course.
When I planned this brunch I had hoped that we would have summer weather, so I made this delightful and surprising Chilled Caramelized Vidalia Onion Soup, but on that Sunday, as the morning progressed with rain and cold winds I decided to serve it hot instead. We did a little taste test and yes, it was just as tasty; so if the weather isn’t cooperating and you need to do a quick change, this soup is perfect.
And then shortly after they arrived, the sun started coming out, the clouds disappeared and we opened up windows! I made a quick decision to chill the bowls while we chatted sipping on orange juice and sparkling water and I changed the soup back to a refreshing cold starter!
Chilled Caramelized Vidalia Onion Soup with Gruyère Brûlé
Makes about 450 mL but it depends on how thick you want your soup to be
Ingredients:
- 600 g Vidalia Onions, finely sliced
- 1/4 cup white balsamic vinegar
- 1/2 cup white wine
- pinch of fresh thyme
- Short spray of non-stick coating
- 1/2 cup water
- 400-500 mL chicken stock or vegetable stock
- 4-5 tbsp finely grated Gruyère cheese
- 1 tbsp chopped chives
- 1 cup non-fat Greek Yogurt
Directions:
- Spray a heavy bottom pan with the non-stick spray and begin cooking the onions with the balsamic and white wine. Cook slowly and steadily until you achieve a lovely golden colour. You may wish to add a bit of water in this process (or you can use EVOO, but I’m trying to keep it lower in fat). Or you can use this technique.
- Add the thyme and stir well.
- Remove from heat and begin adding the stock a little at a time, whilst blending smoothly with an immersion blender. Keep adding stock until your desired thickness is achieved. Press through a fine sieve and refrigerate.
- Preheat the oven’s broiler to high. Place a piece of parchment onto a flat baking sheet and place about 1 tbsp of the Gruyère into rounds being careful to keep them well separated. Watch as they broil because they can burn very easily. The oils from the cheese will render and you will see this beautiful lace pattern appear.
- Remove the parchment from the cookie sheet to allow them to cool a bit, then carefully lift each one onto a bit of paper towel to soak up the extra oils. Store flat, uncovered until needed — these may be made in advance!
Plating:
- With the immersion blender, give the chilled soup one more blend adding in the Greek Yogurt and blend until very very smooth. Return to the fridge.
- Chill the bowls for about one hour. Ladle the chilled soup carefully into each bowl, garnish with the gruyère crisp and some chopped chives.
- Serve immediately.
Notes:
- Some bloggers have commented that the amount of vinegar is too acidic for their taste in the onion confit or caramelized onion, so you may cut it down, or alternatively add a tbsp of brown sugar to the caramelization process to balance. We did not find it too acidic.
- For the gruyère brûlé, you can use a small brûlé torch to brown it up a bit more if it’s not crispy enough coming out of the oven.
- For my first attempt with the brûlé on top of the soup, in addition to broiling the cheese in the oven, I actually used the torch while it was one the soup, it was an interesting combo of cold and hot.
[…] Chilled Caramelized Vidalia Onion Soup with Gruyère Brûlé […]
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Holding you to your words, Eva, expect to see you in the Hudson Valley. Thanks you for your compliments, you are making me blush. I am glad we could meet and I sure had a grand time. Can’t believe we both forgot to take photos of the food. Did not realize how late it was and hope you did not sleep on your job the day after.
That soup looks sumptuous, with the hot humid weather we are having this is the soup of choice.
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What a great summer soup! Vidalia is probably my absolute favourite type of onion, so I’d be willing to give this a try… despite it being both cold and a soup. I haven’t been able to get over that yet. 🙂
Hope you stayed safe and dry during the flooding this week!
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Thank you kindly Amber, I am a huge soup fan, so I do hope you have a chance to try it, I think you will like it, the caramelized vidalia onions are so sweet!
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What a fun summer for you! You’ve gotten to meet so many blogger friends. I love it! And this soup…there are no words. I’m just drooling and wishing it was waiting at home for me. 🙂
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Hi Kristy, yes, I sure have been fortunate to meet with so many wonderful bloggers, and I have a sneaking suspicion it will happen again soon! It makes the world seem very small.
Thank you for your lovely compliment for the soup, it’s a tasty one that can be frozen for future use and I love that it may be eaten hot or cold.
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that has to be the best looking soup I have ever seen!
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Thank you Jessica, that is some compliment, I am very flattered indeed.
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I love the sweetness of onions and the crisps look perfect! I’m so excited about my upcoming visit to Canada although I wish I could meet up with you! 😀
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Ho Lorraine, thank you for your lovely compliments. I too am excited to have you come to Canada and I hope that your schedule and possible airfares will make it easy for me to come to you! We’ll try, anyway.
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wow, the charred guyere chese “brulee” make the onion soup fancy even more,
btw, t hink i would love to enjoy the sour hot since chilled soup is not suits for my asian licking
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Hi Dedy, a chilled soup is certainly an acquired taste, but rest assured that this recipe is very tasty either way.
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Hi Eva, happy to see you online this morning and hoping that your family weathered the storm/flood situation well through the night. This recipe reminds me of a sophisticated version of French onion soup that is absolutely ideal for a hot summer’s day. I really enjoy cold soup and I have to say that your gruyère crisps are just beyond beautiful. I love the way everything comes together in that last photo. I’m not sure I could ever make anything quite so delicate but the image is sure inspiring me to try!
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HI Kelly, we were fortunate and did not suffer any damage from the storms, they were certainly wild! We even survived the power outages, until the following afternoon when Toronto Hydro intentionally shut power off in order to clean up the mess left by the flooding at a local power station; we didn’t get it back until 10pm, but at least we got it back!
Yes, this soup is very reminiscent of French Onion Soup and had I used a beef stock or veal stock it probably would have even been more so. The gruyère crisps did turn out well, I was very pleased, thank you for the lovely compliment.
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Oh, I remember those packed commuter train rides when the humidity made them unbearable! They certainly do make you happy to get home. How wonderful that you and Norma met. It’s nice to be able to attach a real live person with their words in a blog.
Your soup, Eva, sounds terrific and I like the idea of using Greek yogurt rather than heavy cream. Those gruyère crisps and your soup bowls made for one very special presentation. I’m glad the weather finally cooperated. A few clouds and a change in the wind direction and you may have been heating it up again. 🙂
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Hi John, the weather has been wet and extremely hot and humid so this soup would still be served cold. The cheese sliding in the way it did was serendipitous, thank you for your lovely words.
It was a blast meeting Norma and I’m looking very much forward to my next blogger rendezvous-vous!
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I’m pleased to hear you are enjoying warm weather but I can’t believe your public transport isn’t air conditioned. Unbelievable. How lovely to have had such a good catch up with Norma. You do seem to be spending time with a lot of bloggers lately – how wonderful xx
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Hi Charlie, most of the busses and all of the subways have A/C, just not the street cars which are slowly being replaced over the next few years.
It is indeed wonderful to be meeting so many of my fellow bloggers, one day it will be our turn to meet.
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I love Norma to bits! I think she’s really clever. Her son and my niece used to play violin together. 🙂
This soup and cheese rounds would make a perfect lunch. I’m envious and would love to be in the same room with you both one day!
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I bet your ears were itching that night because we chatted about the sheer coincidence of that story! Small world indeed. Norma travels quite a bit, so heading over to Australia is not out of the question for either of us!
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Wow, what an incredible idea for a soup! I never would have thought of making a soup out of caramelised onions in a million years but now the idea’s there… I’m definitely going to do it sometime… if for nothing else than because I’m in love with that last photo… it looks so tasty! Did you try it unblended? I’d be curious to see what it’s like.
So cool that you met Norma too – you sure do get around! 😀
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Thanks Charles. No, we didn’t try it unblended, it would have been too much like French onion soup. But you just have me a great idea, still blending the soup smooth but adding this Indian crispy fried onions into it for texture.
It was great meeting Norma, she and I had a lot to talk about.
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Eva I love the lacy cheese rounds! What great food embellishment!
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Thank you Zsuzsa, hope you are well.
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Eva, I envy you once more! I have to travel more, especially closer to the places where fellow bloggers live 😉
The soup looks fabulous and I love the second presentation. So chic! Actually, even though it’s hot and humid here too, I have been longing for a ramen (Japanese stock with noodles) for quite a long time and finally had it today. It was excellent in spite of the heat.
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Thank you very much Sissi, the second presentation was certainly serendipitous. I too have had those type of cravings, mine are usually for Pho, the Vietnamese rare beef noodle soup.
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This looks super tasty, Eva! I’ve got to try it, especially since this week is going to be hot and humid again. Long live our brief Toronto summer!
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Thank you for your lovely comment Michela, it works very well hot or cold so I’m planning to make it again when the temperatures plummet. Hope thre wasn’t too much damage with the rains yesterday.
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I love a chilled soup in the summer Eva. Although I have about four or five versions of gazpacho, I’ve never tried any other soup cold. This will could well be get made at the end of the week if our heat wave stays with us.
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Hi David, thanks for your comment, the soup is definitely worth the caramelization process, very tasty with the gruyére lace.
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I love Norma’s blog too! Wonderful that you two got to meet each other.
The soup sounds fabulous, Eva, perfect for the hot summer days.
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Thanks Angie I’m always do jealous of her gardening skills! The soup was very tasty indeed.
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The humidity needs to quit! Brutal is right. 🙂 Beautiful soup and sounds like you had a lovely time.
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Thanks Virginia, the soup was quite refreshing and pretty too; it’s also rather tasty served warm. We’ve had a lot of rain too, not a pretty summer.
It was a blast meeting my blogging friend.
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No this summer is being a bit troublesome so far. I guess we got spoiled last year!
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I’ve never had a cold soup but it sounds like a great idea in this hot muggy weather. And the switch between hot and cold service would have stressed me out but it sounds like you handled it with your usual cool aplomb.
I love the lacy cheese fans standing up in the bowl. They’re a lot more elegant than laying the rounds on the surface, I think. A happy accident. 🙂
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Thanks so much Maria, it worked out very well. I love a chilled soup in the summer. Yes the lacy cheese did indeed turn out much better with the little accident or shall I say, opportunity!
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From the sounds of your heat, you needed this chilling soup!
It looks very delicious, great flavour 🙂
Cheers
CCU
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Thank you kindly CCU.
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A very interesting soup, I have not ever heard of this before.
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Hi Lizzy, it’s a similar but not identical flavour of French Onion Soup.
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