Kitchen Basics: Caramelised Onions

Sweet and sticky caramelised onions are a flavor workhorse, lending a mighty punch to anything you add them to. Toss them into salads, frittatas, pastas, quiches, you name it.

Caramelised onions are a perfect example of cooking alchemy and just like regular onions which have the grace and freedom to move in all sorts of circles, caramelised onions are also happy to mingle with a variety of ingredients, ratcheting up flavours a notch or two.

If you cook up a batch at the weekend you can have them hanging around for anything that might be in need of just a little something extra. Making homemade pizza? Throw on caramelised onion. Boring old grilled cheese need a little pizzazz? Layer in some caramelised onion. Pasta feeling a little tired? You guessed it…toss in some caramelized onion!

Even better, they are ridiculously easy to make. Take a couple of onions and peel and slice. Cook in some olive oil over lowish heat for about 15 minutes, nonchalantly tossing around every so often and you’ll end up with this.

Keep going for another 15 minutes and you get to here.

At this point I like to throw in a tablespoon of brown sugar and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar. It’s not entirely necessary but I do love the extra little jolt of flavour it provides. Swish it all around, turn the heat down to low and after another 15 minutes you’ll end up with this.

Sweet, jammy onions. Perfect!

Now, the cooking of caramelised onions is as much art as science. You can try to make them cook faster by using higher heat but you’ll need to move them frequently to prevent burning. Trust me, easily done! If the bottom of the pan does start to darken a little too much and dry out, I’ll add a little bit of water (chicken stock or wine can also be used to great effect if you have them on hand) and scrape up all of the bits.

But the best thing to do is put the heat on low, set the pan on the back burner and let them gently sizzle while you’re busy doing something else, just giving them a quick stir every once in a while.

The simple, basic onion – all dressed up and ready to party.