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French onion soup is a classic and pasta bake is another. Today, we're bringing them together. Slow caramelized onions in a rich, beefy sauce, baked with pasta and a bubbling cheese crust. This is comfort food at its absolute best. This is everything we're going to need right here. If you can't consume alcohol, you can use stock. I'll have all the details in the video as well as in the description. We'll start with one kilo or 2.2 pounds of brown or yellow onions. This looks like far too much, but after about half an hour of slow cooking, they'll shrink to less than a quarter of their size. Slice into thin, even half moons. Consistency does matter here because if some are thick and others are thin, you'll end up with burnt bits and undercooked pieces. Next, crush three cloves of garlic with the side of your knife. This just breaks down the allicin compound, releasing most of its flavor. The garlic will burn easily, so we'll add this later on once the onions are ready. We want this to be finely minced. You can also grate it, but mincing for this recipe is the better option. I'm using some thyme. It is optional, but I highly recommend it. It adds a beautiful flavor. We need two teaspoons of either fresh or dried. If you are using fresh and you have really woody stems, I recommend picking off the leaves prior to cutting them. As for me, these are really soft stems, so I can chop up the whole thing. Now, we're going to grate 200 grams or seven ounces of Gruyere cheese, 100 grams or 3.5 ounces of mozzarella, and 50 grams of parmesan. Gruyere is the classic choice for French onion soup. It's nutty, slightly sweet, and it melts beautifully. Mozzarella gives us the stretch, and that parmesan brings a really nice salty umami kick. Also, don't mix these together. We want to keep them separate, as we will be layering the cheese later on. In a large pot over medium heat, melt 60 grams or four tablespoons of unsalted butter with two tablespoons of olive oil. Add in all of the onions and a nice pinch of salt. The pot will look completely overloaded, but trust the process. They will collapse down as they release their water. We want to cook these low and slow for about 30 to 35 minutes, stirring often. They will release a lot of their water and also deglaze the pan in their own liquid, just creating even more flavor. Halfway through, and once the onions are jammy and golden, add in that minced garlic, and cook this for about a minute to a minute and a half, just to get the aroma going into the onions. Add in 20 grams or two tablespoons of plain all-purpose flour, as well as the chopped up thyme, or dried thyme if you're using that. The flour creates a roux, thickening the sauce so it clings to the pasta. And if you want it gluten-free, you can use 20 grams or two tablespoons of rice flour, or whisk 20 grams or two tablespoons of cornstarch with cold stock and stir that in instead. And just make sure that you cook this for about two minutes as the raw flour can taste pasty. Another optional ingredient is one tablespoon of brown sugar. I know there's already sweetness in the onions, but adding the brown sugar just adds that extra little hit. It goes really well with the sweet and savory note of this dish, but it is up to you if you want to use it. Traditionally, this next step uses 250 milliliters or one cup of dry white wine to deglaze, but I'm on a weight cut right now and I don't really want to keep alcohol in my house, so I'm stopping it for beef stock. If you have got wine, use it. It adds fruitiness and acidity. If not, stock keeps it rich and hearty. Both are perfectly valid. Make sure everything is thoroughly mixed through. All of those flavors have become friends and reduce it by half. Add in 750 milliliters or three cups of beef stock. Don't worry if you've already used beef stock before in replace of wine, that's fine. Mix that all together and simmer this uncovered for about 10 minutes until glossy and thickened, and we can season this generously with cracked black pepper. If your sauce is too thin, just simmer it for longer. If it's too thick, you can add a splash of stock or you can take some of the pasta water to loosen it up. In the meantime, salt a pot of boiling water and cook 500 grams or 1.1 pounds of the pasta of your choice for two minutes less than the packet instructions. And before draining, reserve half a cup of that pasta water. Now go back to our French onion. This is nice and thick and smells fantastic. What I'm going to do is put a spoon in there and if you can run your finger through it and create ribbons, then you know that the sauce is a perfect consistency and it's ready for the next step. You can also stop here and just use this as a French onion soup. It is absolutely fantastic. Once the pasta is cooked and drained, we can add it into our French onion. Just mix everything together. Make sure all of that pasta is completely coated. Like I said, if you have penne or rigatoni, all of the sauce is going to go into each individual tube and just create even more flavor. And we can adjust the consistency with that reserved pasta water. It's going to help emulsify that sauce and thicken it up. Also, if your sauce is way too thick, you can just add a touch more beef stock. What we can do now is lightly grease a baking dish with some unsalted butter or a little bit of spray oil. Add in half of the French onion pasta mix and spread it out so it's all sitting flat. Now for the cheese, we're going to layer it. So the Gruyere goes down first for nuttiness, the mozzarella in the middle for that gooey stretch and Parmesan on top for crispness. If you dump it all in at once, you'll end up with a heavy sheet of cheese that just peels off straight away. And what I'm doing is putting half of the cheese mix in the middle, then putting the rest of that French onion pasta mix in, spread it out again and top it with the remaining cheese in layers and make sure you spread it all the way to the edges. That way we get that beautiful cheese crust and that even crust all over the top. All we need to do is bake this at 200 degrees Celsius or 400 degrees Fahrenheit for about 20 minutes until bubbling and golden. And then once it's out of the oven, let it rest for five minutes before serving. That way the sauce sets slightly and your first scoop comes out neat instead of collapsing into a puddle and mine collapsed a little bit because I really couldn't wait. So if you've learned anything from this video, don't be like me. So with everything said and done, there's one thing left to do and that is we can then dig in. This is everything you love from a French onion soup and everything you love from a pasta bake. Put them two together, this creates an absolutely incredible dish. If you enjoyed this video, hit that like button, leave a comment and subscribe if you haven't already and I'll see you in the next one. Thanks for watching.