Vegan French Onion Soup with Mushrooms
Today is the day of days when you will finally finish reading that book that’s been sitting on your bedside table for weeks. Or the day you will watch that one documentary that’s been on your watchlist for ages. Why? Because today we are cooking an onion soup that is not complicated but requires patience. While the onions are frying in the pan and the soup is simmering and baking, there is enough time to devote to your to-do lists.
Our soup is strongly inspired by the French classic soupe à l’oignon, which is covered with slices of bread or crôutons and gratinated with cheese at the end. Heavenly! Historically, the gratinated cheese layer was added later and balances off the modern version of French onion soup. It was particularly popular in the 19th century in the Parisian market hall “Les Halles” (now a huge shopping center) – both as a breakfast for the workers there and for all the night owls looking for a filling hangover meal after a party.
There are, of course, many different recipes for onion soup, but in general, you can summarize that a lot of onions are chopped and sautéed for a long time until they are almost golden. They then simmer in one or more liquids and are often gratinated with slices of bread and cheese as described. There are already plenty of recipes for vegan onion soups, which is why we’ve made another small modification and are combining the soup with porcini mushrooms today.
For this, we use dried porcini mushrooms, which are soaked beforehand. Opinions differ on the broth that is produced. You can read that the soaking water should definitely be disposed of, but also that it is great for cooking. We can’t take the decision away from you and therefore give you two options: either you use the stock directly for cooking or pour it off and use vegetable stock instead, in which the onions continue to simmer. The latter would also be the case if you use fresh mushrooms instead of dried ones. Either way, we say: Bon appétit!
Vegan French Onion Soup with Mushrooms
Ingredients
- 40 g (1.5 oz) dried porcini mushrooms
- 1 litre (4 cups) hot water (or vegetable broth)
- 750 g (1.66 lbs) onions
- 3 tbsp vegan butter
- 1 tbsp flour (type 405)
- 200 ml (0.75 cup) vegan white wine
- 6 springs thyme
- 1 baguette
- 120 g (4.5 oz) vegan shredded cheese
- salt
- pepper
- white wine vinegar
Instructions
Pour hot water over the dried porcini mushrooms and leave to soak for 30–60 minutes.
In the meantime, peel, halve and thinly slice all the onions. Melt vegan butter in a large frying pan and caramelize the onions for about 45 minutes over low to medium heat until they are sweet and golden brown.
Drain the porcini mushrooms, but keep the mushroom stock and set aside. Add the soaked mushrooms to the onion pan and fry for 3–4 minutes. Then dust everything with flour and deglaze with vegan white wine. Stir in the mushroom stock (or alternatively vegetable broth). Add the thyme sprigs and simmer the soup for about 20 minutes. Then season to taste with salt, pepper and a little white wine vinegar.
Preheat the oven to 220 °C / 430 °F (convection heat). Slice the baguette and bake them in the oven while it's preheating until they're crispy.
Remove the thyme stems from the soup and transfer the soup to ramekins. Brush the baguette slices with vegan butter and place them on top of the soup. Mix vegan shredded cheese with a little vegetable oil and sprinkle it over the slices of bread. Bake the soup at 220 °C / 430 °F (convection heat) until the cheese crust on top has melted and is golden brown.
