What Makes A Good French Onion Soup & My Top 5 Chain/Local Chicago Spots
So as you can see from the clip above – I take French Onion Soup very seriously.
Apparently based on the reaction to this on Twitter so do many people. That makes me feel happy because it’s an elite level soup that can easily be fucked up, but when it’s good it’s a home run addition to any meal. Just truly the perfect pre-meal soup if you’re at a steakhouse or really any other nice sit down place where the lights are dim and the beer is cold.
There are a couple prerequisites though.
1. Gotta have the cheese layer
Like absolutely mandatory to even be in the discussion. I’m sorry, Panera. They’re strong at other soups and used to have the layer but then they got rid of it a while back. No idea why though. That’s French Onion suicide. Take it outta the shop if you ain’t gonna do it right.
2. Can’t be too salty
French Onion is the oddball soup where you’re more likely to get it with WAY too much flavor than you are to get a watered down one. Watch that boiler, Chef. Don’t let it get too salty to the point where I need to take 3 Tums instead of 2 before I go to bed.
3. Needs a full piece of bread in it under the cheese
None of that crouton bullshit. You want to play in the big leagues than you gotta come hard with a nice sizable hunk of bread right under the cheese layer. This is the best thing about French Onion. You battle to scrape through that delicious cheese, scraping it off the sides and shit only to be met with another equally amazing part of the soup which is the piece of bread. It’s like when you see that present under the tree on Christmas that has two boxes on top of eachother. You know it’s always going to be a good one.
4. Gotta have the right onions
This is the point where it gets a tad hazy because I’ve never cooked French Onion soup, but everybody knows what the right onions taste like. I honestly shouldn’t even have to put this as a bullet point, but you’d be surprised how many places mess this up. You wouldn’t use a slice of Kraft cheese in a burrito…so do the right thing and put the correct caramelized onions into your French Onion soup.
So without further ado here are my top spots to get some French Onion:
LOCAL CHICAGO RESTAURANT RANKING
Please keep in mind that there are many places I haven’t tried yet. No, I haven’t had Mon Ami Gabi which I’ve heard is amazing, and plan to try as well as many of the other French places in the city. Especially BoeufHaus since it was recommended by our guy Chef Joe Flamm. I’m just not a big fancy boy so I haven’t been able to make it to those places yet, even though it is now my duty to as I’m sure they’re amazing.
1. L. Woods on Lincoln
The grand daddy of them all as far as I’m concerned. They have all the intangibles and supply it into a bowl that would make a 100 pound St. Bernard jealous. Supper Clubs just have an incredible vibe to top off the whole experience.
2. Golden Steer in Forest Park
Golden Steer is a place that’s known for their French Onion and they do it right. A great feature here is that it comes with every dinner. No upcharge no nothin’ which alot of places are guilty of with French Onion. They know the people like it so they’re nice enough to include it into everything.
3. Gale Street Inn on Milwaukee
Pound for pound Gale Street Inn is my favorite restaurant in Chicago. It’s full of my people, provides ribs that you’re just not going to find anywhere else, and their French Onion is a great way to warm ya up for them. My only knock is that you can’t get it as your soup with your meal. I’ve been trying to haggle with the waiter for years to add this feature, but they just won’t budge. I’ll get em one day though.
4. Carson’s Ribs – River East & Deerfield
Carson’s probably offers the best combo of them all before the meal here because their cornbread is no joke. Like I thought I had good cornbread before I’d been to Carson’s, but they’re really on another level. Now don’t be a psycho and dip it into your soup, but enjoy a lil bit of both before you get those ribs.
CHAIN RESTAURANT RANKING
Please keep in mind that chain restaurants vary big time from location to location. Yes, you may have had a bad one at one of these places before, but this is a list of places where I’ve had a good (or serviceable) one before. They’re usually not better than the local spots, but since Barstool is a national brand it makes sense to talk about a couple places that anybody in the United States can have.
1. Longhorn
Without question the #1 chain French Onion Soup when it’s done right. My local location has been slacking lately, but when they were on they were fucking on. Like to the point where it could compete with some of the non-chain places. If you’re in a pinch and are really feeling French Onion than this is your spot.
2. Weber Grill
Weber’s in a weird spot here where I don’t know if they could’ve qualified as a local spot or a chain since there’s really not a ton of locations. Regardless, this is where it ends up which probably gains it some leverage as it took the #2 spot.
3. Miller’s Ale House
I had this for the first time recently and was pleasantly surprised. Very solid all around, but could use a little bit of bread on the side.
4. Outback Steakhouse
Outback has one wild factor that none of these places do and you already know what it is. It’s that lovely pumpernickel bread that really brings out the eyes of the soup. Could be the best bread in the game to pair with French Onion.
5. Applebees
Serviceable. Probably varies the most from location to location as some Applebee’s make it with love and some definitely do not. It’s in a weird spot where it shouldn’t get a ton of love, but it should get a lot more than people give it.
Okay, I just wrote over 1,000 words on French Onion Soup. I’m gonna go take a short walk to clear my head. Maybe make a paper airplane? Idk. It is what it is.