Recipe News: Pretzels and beer, a perfect duo, bring harmony to onion soup

"Dark brown, rich with a hint of sweetness. Altbier fits that description. So does onion soup. And the two can certainly be in harmony.

During the tasting Eric Asimov hinted that he would like a pretzel recipe for these ales, so I decided to make pretzel dumplings with cheese to serve in the soup instead of the usual toasted French bread covered with cheese.

It turned out to be a fine package. While tasting the ales, I thought their malty, toasted, spicy flavors, with bitterness that sometimes suggested buckwheat and burnt caramel, would go with other soups, like lentil, and with pungent washed-rind cheeses.

The onion soup I made followed a fairly classic recipe, though I deglazed the onions with some ale for another synergistic touch. There is ale in the dumplings, too. The recipe for those was based, to some degree, on my formula for matzo balls, which I make with sparkling water. Ale's fizz was a fine substitute. With this combination of ingredients, mustard was a natural seasoning."

includes recipe for:

ONION SOUP WITH PRETZEL-CHEESE DUMPLINGS

Full article here.

January 27, 2007

Recipe News: Pretzels and beer, a perfect duo, bring harmony to onion soup