Roasted Onions With Blue Cheese And Walnuts

I love onions! Give 'em to me roasted, sautéed, fried or turned into beautifully battered rings!  Any way you please.  I am a huge fan of the allium family in all its guises, really.  I just don't get to cook with leeks as Mr P. doesn't eat them.  Even though it took about 30 years before he told me this!  Always something new to learn about a spouse, I guess.  

Speaking of onions, when our French nephew was small, we bought a children's book about onions (yes, onions!) to read to him on his visits here.  Ever since, Mr P. and I have quoted lines from it to each other, the most enduring being: "Où sont mes oignons?"  Yes, Jean-Claude the French onion seller from Dieppe had lost his onions!  He takes the ferry across the English Channel to sell them but somehow they vanish.  Only to be found again when the English cat Quizz was found to be sleeping on a bed of onions!  Pourquoi?  Who knows, my friends? :=)      

This recipe is from Danielle Alvarez's Recipes for a lifetime of Beautiful Cooking.  She is a Sydney-based chef and cookbook author (co-author of this book is Libby Travers).  She uses blue cheese and walnuts here, but as Mr P. does not like blue cheese (he says it tastes like ants!) I used fetta in its place (and pecans 'cos I had them in the pantry). 

good enough to eat :=)

Serves 4:

ingredients:

4 small red onions

2 Tbs EV olive oil

1 Tbs honey

1 Tbs white or red wine vinegar

60g/2.25 oz. blue cheese (or fetta!)    see Notes

80 mL/2.7 oz. single (pure) cream

sea salt flakes

For the garnish:

freshly-ground black pepper, amount of your choosing

40g./1.4 oz. walnuts or pecans, toasted and roughly chopped

1 Tbs chives, chopped (or use your fave herb)

Method:

On goes your oven to 180C/350F to heat up

Slice your onions in half from root to tip, and peel 'em

Line the baking tray with baking paper, then coat the paper with the EV olive oil

Place the onion halves cut-side down onto the lined tray

Weigh them down with another baking tray, and bake for 30 minutes

Then take out the tray, flip the onions over, and bake again (sans the other tray) for 20 minutes

When finished baking, leave them to cool for a few minutes

Cut off the root ends, and separate the onion layers

Now drizzle with the honey and the vinegar, sprinkle on the salt, and back into the oven for 8-10 minutes till beautifully browned

Then take the tray out of the oven, whack up the heat to 210C/410F

The blue cheese or fetta gets crumbled over the onions, and then you are going to pour over the cream

And back into the oven for 7 minutes, then to be finished off with a fabulous amount of ground black pepper

Sprinkle with the chopped nuts and chives, and eat!

(I served these with bought-in chicken skewers)

Notes:

I used a delicious marinated Greek fetta in this dish!  Tho' you could use any type of fetta you fancy

Danielle suggests frying the onions first in an oven-proof pan, then putting the whole pan into the oven, so feel free ...

 

ingredients gathered

halved, peeled and ready to bake at 180C

glistening and glorious

on go the cheese and cream

throw on the chives and nuts

succulent :=) and served with chicken skewers

c. Sherry M.

oh yes indeed! Where are my onions? :)