Vegan French Onion Soup - Vegan MoFo #21

   Hi Friends!

   I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend.  Mine was good in spite of the wet weather that has been gracing Southern Ontario for the past five days!  My Saturday morning was spent in bed watching Will & Grace reruns with my cat curled up next to me.  That's totally out of character for me but I definitely enjoyed the indulgence.  I think Patchie was way more thrilled that I was vegging out, though.  I'm hardly ever home and when I am, I'm rarely sitting down in one spot so I think she thought she won the lottery having all of my attention on her.   She may have attachment issues... I'm looking into a specialist for her.

See what I mean?  Stucklikeglue.

   Moving on...  This week, because of the wet, cold, gray weather, I'm craving soup!  I made a couple of batches yesterday, and one of them was French Onion Soup.  I love this soup and I'm so glad that I was able to find a recipe that actually worked and tasted good.  A while ago, when my mom was making French Onion soup, she made a vegan version for me.  I was going to ask her how she made it but she was a little busy this weekend doing this:

My mom's baked goods at the Digby Farmer's Market! 

   So I decided to look up some recipes on Google.  I found a few good ones but I decided to use the one from The Inventive Vegetarian.  This recipe was awesome and I only tweaked it a little so I won't post it here but I will include the link.

   

   Since I'm not posting a recipe I will share my tips for staying tear-free (almost) while cutting massive amounts of onions.

1. Light Candles - As you can see in the photo above, I lit a couple of them.
2. Open your windows - let the fresh air in and let the onion fumes out!  I have two windows in my kitchen and they were both open.  I was freezing but at least I didn't cry (that much)!
3. Wear some sunglasses! - I know that one seems like a crazy tip but I really do think it helped me.
4. Use a Mandoline - I sliced those onions in no time!  Everyone knows that your eyes start to water as soon as you cut into an onion.  The faster you can get it done the better!

Those are my tips for staying almost tear-free while cutting onions.  I can honestly say that I only had a few tears.  Normally I would be crying like a baby after cutting into half an onion - but after FOUR onions I hardly had any tears.  I did leave my sunglasses on for a little while after I was finished with the onions, just in case.

On to the soup...

My beautiful bowl of onions!

In the pot, ready to get cookin'!

Here are the very minor tweaks that I made to this recipe:

Instead of using Mushroom Stock I used vegetarian "Beef" Bouillon cubes.  First, I hate mushrooms.  I know 'hate' is a strong word and I always advise children against saying hate about food... BUT, I'm an adult and I know I really, really, REALLY do not like mushrooms!. So it's okay if I say I hate them!  Ha.  Plus, I had the cubes in my cupboard so it was a no-brainer. 

For the wine, I used a Pinot Grigio because that's what I had on hand.  Plus I love it, so I knew it would be good in this recipe.  Don't cook with a wine that you don't like the taste of!

For the cheese, I obviously did not use Swiss.  Instead, I used Daiya Mozzarella Shreds and it was perfect for this dish.

For the bread, I used a whole grain baguette instead of white French bread.

I also did not bake this soup the way that she does in her recipe.  I simply ladled the soup in the dishes, added the toasted bread and cheese on top, and put it in the oven on broil until the cheese melted.

Here's how it turned out...

   This soup was delicious which made me so happy because I miss my mom's French Onion soup.  And, my sister came over for dinner and loved this soup.  Yay!  Oh, and the cute dishes?  I found them at the Dollar Store for $2 each.  And they're oven safe.  Bonus! 

Stay tuned for tomorrow's soup recipe.  And in the meantime, please stay safe if you live in and around the 'Storm Watch' areas for Hurricane Sandy.

Love,

Ves xx