Well, the first recipe I tried turned out to be a rather big success, so I think I am going to declare that I have conquered “cooking” and must now move on to something else.  Today I made Onion Soup out of the Les Halles cookbook.  It took awhile to get to the end result, but the time spent was well worth it.  The recipe starts with a bunch of onions, sliced thinly on the mandolin (I still have my finger tips), which are reduced down for about 25 minutes with a stick of butter.

Next, balsamic vinegar and port wine are added, along with some chicken stock, cubed bacon (I didn’t say it was healthy) and seasoning.

This is left to simmer for about an hour.  Next, it’s ladeled into crocks, topped with a crouton (Julie’s bread from yesterday), and a handful of Gruyere and put under the broiler.

The result was some of the best onion soup I have ever had.  It had a great flavor.  Next time I think we could use a bit more stock, as the balance of soup to onion wasn’t quite where I would like it, and I will probably hit the cheese with the propane torch to give it a little “extra”, but overall it was a rousing success for my first try.  This cooking thing isn’t too hard so far.