As a kid, the smell of caramelized onions was common in my house. The rich scent of pungent onions melting into the fatty delicious butter, as they become soft and sweet- well, let’s just say if I could bottle it and carry it around with me, I would.
My dad taught me how to caramelize onions pretty early- to be fair, it’s a great task for a kid as there aren’t many steps and the success rate is close to 100%. It was always my job as his sous chef and I’m pretty sure that’s why I love them so much, that and they’re just so freaking good.
So what does it mean to caramelize something? Well, the science part literally translates to converting the sugars in a vegetable or fruit into caramel using heat. The less scientific description is turning a crunchy, raw, eye-watering onion into a soft, sweet, buttery onion that you want to eat with a spoon, or your fingers if you are shameless like me.
Pro-tip: Use either a non-stick pan or a cast iron so that your onions soak up the butter and don’t get stuck to the bottom.
Okay, are you ready to do this? Let’s go.
Step 1: Slice Your Onions
This will be the hardest part of the entire process. I hope you’re ready. Carefully slice off the stem end of your onion (the one that has the ponytail looking side), place the flat side down and slice long ways from the root (the hairy end) to the cutting board. You should now have two even halves of an onion. Peel both and cut the root ends off. Now, look closely and you should see light grooves running the length of the onion. These will be your slicing guides; follow them and slice up both halves of the onion.
Step 2: Melt Butter
Plop a massive hunk of butter into a pan that’s over medium heat and let it get nice and melty. Once it’s liquid, throw in all your onions. Make sure you do this before the butter browns though, otherwise it will head towards burnt during the process.
Step 3: Low and Slow
Okay, people, this is the most important step. Start at medium heat just to get the onions nice and warm but then turn that sucker down within just a couple minutes. The worst thing that can possibly happen with low heat is that it takes forever. But the worst thing that happens with high heat is you char your beautiful onions to a black, miserable death. So. The moral of the story here is to take your time and don’t get impatient.
Step 4: Don’t Forget the Salt
We’ve talked about this before but it’s especially important here. A light sprinkling of salt when your onions first go in the pan, and then a couple more times throughout the process is crucial. For one, it’s going to help the onions break down and get even softer and delicious. Plus, salt tastes good, butter tastes good, so obviously you should salt your buttery onions.
Caramelized onions can be eaten with or on just about anything. They make a wonderful addition to the top of a steak or burger, can be used in soups (like French onion, mmmm), and used in pasta dishes. Because they embody multiple different levels of flavor and texture- sweet, salty, fatty- they are the perfect buddy to so many foods.
This is not something to rush. Onions deserve tender, loving care, so throw them in a pan with hot butter and get comfortable. Seriously though, don’t try and speed things up by turning up the heat or anything crazy, I promise it will only make you sad.
