Bone Broth Onion Soup

So simple for how good it is.

Ingredients:

– Beef Marrow Bones, 6-8″ total length in shorter pieces are best.
– 2 large sweet onions, sliced into very thin 1/4 rings.
– 2 medium carrots, peeled and chopped into 3 shorter lengths each.
– 1 celery stalk chopped into three shorter lengths
-1 fresh parsley knot
-4 tbsp butter
-1 jigger of frost or ice cider, or 1/8 cup of semi-dry artisan cider, sherry or port.

Preparation:

Place bones in a large saucepan, add lightly salted water to 2" above the bones, bring to a boil, reduce heat and cover. If starting in the morning, simmer stock all day. If evening simmer till bedtime, turn off burner overnight, let bones steep, and return to simmer until lunchtime. Remove from burner, allow to cool, remove bones, push out marrow and reserve.

Add vegetables to the stock, bring to boil and simmer for 20 minutes. Remove them with a slotted spoon, reserve the carrot for future a future dish or a side and strain the liquid from the other vegetables by pressing them against the screen of a strainer with the back of the spoon over the pot then discard.

Melt the butter over med. low heat, add the onions and stir regularly to cook them down evenly and then to prevent any from burning. Attend them patiently until they begin to caramelize and brown residue starts to form on the bottom of the pot. Regularly scrape this up before it burns and stir it into the onions until they all have even tan color. Add the cider or sherry, allow the alcohol to evaporate, then stir the thickened liquid up into the onions.

Now add as much stock as needed to establish the onion-to-stock balance you wish. Reserve unused stock for future use, or add water as applies. Be careful to taste the stock to taste to avoid watering it down. It should have a deep savory sweet flavor. Proper salting to taste helps bring that out.

Ladle into deep 5” diameter (+/- ) oven proof glazed ceramic bowl balancing stock and onion volume, and leaving 1” of space below the rim. Float a good size home- made, seasoned crouton raft, top with cheese of preference, set bowls on baking dish to catch spills, place on the highest rack possible, set broiler to low and keep your eye on the bowls. My preference is a nutty straw-colored one with a bit of sour bite. The cheese will bubble quickly. When you like the look (la pinta, in Spanish), remove whole pan with oven mitts to heat proof surface and distribute bowls your mates’ waiting placemats or trivets.