Dry Wine recommendations? Winery.

Hi! I've rarely ever used wine in cooking, so I have no idea what kind to buy for this recipe. Can anyone help me out? Thanks!

S
  • Posted by: S
  • March 19, 2023
  • 627 views
  • 3 Comments
Best French Onion Soup
Recipe question for: Best French Onion Soup

3 Comments

Nancy March 20, 2023
Long story short - not fancy, use whatever white wine you have on hand or like or have easy access to. Or do some shopping for fancier ingredients for a special occasion. Your choice.

Long story long - there's a wide range of choice for the liquor (main and accent) used in this soup. For main, white, red or fortified wine (sherry or port) or cider. For accent, brandy, cognac or Calvados.

Even though it's famous for being served in the morning at the now defunct Les Halles market), this dish is not haute cuisine with strict rules.

In fact, it has more in common with French provincial home cooking where people used every bit of what they had on hand (one of the original "nose to tail" cuisines).

I personally learned this dish both from my mother's home cooking and Julia Child's recipe (which uses unspecified white wine & cognac).
http://juliachildsrecipes.com/soup/julia-childs-french-onion-soup/

However, I have since learned variations in attitude and ingredients from:
1) Nigel Slater, for reminding us of relaxed home cooking (he uses unspecified white wine)
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2010/feb/21/french-onion-soup-recipe-slater

2) Serious Eats which gives an exhaustive and maybe exhausting treatment of which onions to use and how to cook them (they use dry sherry)
https://www.seriouseats.com/french-onion-soup-recipe

3) Felicity Cloake series in the Guardian, where she views and chooses ingredients and methods from several top recipes to come up with a "perfect" version of a famous dish (she uses cider and Calvados)
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2012/mar/22/how-to-cook-perfect-french-onion-soup
 
Nancy March 22, 2023
Ok, all the above gives you freedom of choice. But if you don’t use wine much in cooking, maybe a short list is more helpful.
A dry white wine…like Pinot Gris, Sauvignon Blanc, Semillon, Chardonnay, dry Riesling.
 
S April 3, 2023
Thank you so much for the pointers and info in the links! Very helpful, Nancy. I'll try to relax a bit and enjoy the process and practice a bit.
 
Recommended by Food52