You can prepare dreamy roasted onions with minimal effort. A side dish both homey and elegant to grace your table on holidays, festive family gatherings and even weeknights.
4large onionssuch as Vidalia, white, yellow or red
1tablespoonolive oil
⅓cupaged balsamic vinegar
12ozsweet dark ale or lagerbrown ale or porter, bock or doppelbock
1tablespoonbrown sugaroptional, in the event that the beer has bitter notes
4tablespoonbutterslice in ½ tablespoon slivers while still cold
thymeto taste, but at least 4 sprigs fresh plus more for garnish or ½ tablespoon dried thyme leaves
1teaspoonsalt and ½ pepperadjust to taste
Instructions
Turn the oven on to 375 F. * Halve the onions lengthwise and peel away the paper layer and the outermost layer immediately underneath it. Rinse the onion halves.
Arrange the rinsed halves face up inside a baking dish. If they do not fit perfectly, do not worry, they will get smaller while slow roasting. Drizzle the olive oil and then the balsamic over them.
Pour the dark beer around the onions and place a sliver of butter on top of each onion. Season with salt and pepper, then thyme.
Bake at 375 F for about half an hour, then pull them out and baste with the juices from the baking dish. You can baste a couple of more times until they are done. Cook for at least 1 hour total time, longer if you'd like softer, sweeter onions. TIP: If the onions begin to brown more than you'd like and the pan juices dry out excessively, add a few tablespoons of water and cover the dish with aluminum foil.
Notes
*Each oven is calibrated differently so if you know yours to be quite strong, consider 350 F.SHORTEN THE TIME If you don't have much time you could roast the onions at 425 F to speed up the process. We recommend slow roasting them at the lower temperature though.MAKE AHEAD Even though baked onions are best served right out of the oven, you can make them ahead. Cook them the day before, let them cool off a bit, cover and keep refrigerated. Reheat in 375 F oven for about 10 minutes. Be sure to spoon over some of the pan liquids over the onions before you take them out of the oven.