Food Bloggers Against Hunger – French Onion Soup and a Giveaway

Today I am so proud to be one of over 200 food bloggers participating in Food Bloggers Against Hunger to help raise awareness about hunger in the U.S. today. I am going to post one of my favorite recipes ever below, but first I wanted to tell you about a new documentary I recently stumbled across called A Place at the Table.

What would you do if you were hungry? Or if you kids were hungry, and you had nothing to feed them? I knew that there was a hunger problem in America, but this documentary opened my eyes, I had no idea how big and how scary this problem really is. Did you know that 1 in 4 kids in this country is going to bed hungry tonight? One in four! I had no idea it was so many. I look at my two little ones and then think about some of my little nieces and nephews and the thought of one (or more!) of them going hungry just breaks my heart. We are so incredibly blessed to have a pantry full of food and full bellies.

A movie like this has me crying, and then gets me mad! It shouldn’t be this way. Americans are not hungry because of a lack of food, they are hungry because they are not able to afford food. Even those on food assistance are only receiving on average $3-$4 per day per person. That means for our family we’d have at most $112 per week. That is actually about what we try to budget for food and can I tell you, it is really hard! It is made even more difficult when you add in my daughter’s food allergies and our quest to be healthy and eat lots of fresh produce. Most people don’t have the resources and skills to do be able to do this, and don’t know how to get those skills and resources. (You can check out my post on eating healthy on a budget here.)

One thing that shocked me in this movie is the existence of “food deserts.” I had no idea there were places that simply didn’t have the option for fresh produce. I naively thought that those who weren’t eating lots of produce either didn’t know what to do with them or just thought they didn’t like fresh fruits and veggies, that buying and eating them just wasn’t a habit. I was shocked when they showed the inside of the tiny local store and the only fresh produce in the entire place was two teeny bananas on the counter.

I encourage you to go watch this movie for yourself. I hope that you will find it as enlightening as I did!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgxxT4xpVNI

You can watch it instantly online either on Amazon or through iTunes, or you can see it at a theater near you.

So what can you do? I highly encourage you to go to this link and let congress to protect federal nutrition programs for our kids.  It takes about 30 seconds to fill out the form and could make such a big difference!

I am also excited to be doing a giveaway today! Two lucky readers will win a companion book to the movie, and another two will win one of these cute little pins. Just fill out the entry form below the pin picture to win.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

And now I’m going to share one of my favorite economical recipes. This recipe is adapted from Tyler Florence’s recipe. The recipe is fancy enough that we have served it to visitors several times and it always goes over really well.

The original recipe calls for red wine, which I leave out both for economical purposes and because we usually don’t have any in the house. Another way to make this more economical is to make your own beef broth either from bones (great recipe here) or we usually use Better Than Boullion. Either option costs way less than buying boxes of premade broth. You can also skip the baguette with Gruyere and just serve the soup, or serve it with an inexpensive homemade bread like my easy whole wheat focaccia. I usually throw a salad on the side to round out the meal.

Food Bloggers Against Hunger - French Onion Soup

 

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Author: Emily - www.thatswhatieat.com

Ingredients

• ½ cup unsalted butter
• 4 onions, sliced
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 fresh thyme sprigs
• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 3 heaping tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 2 quarts plus 1 cup beef broth
• 1 baguette, sliced
• ½ pound grated Gruyere

Instructions

1. Melt the stick of butter in a large pot over medium heat.
2. Add the onions, garlic, bay leaves, thyme, and salt and pepper and cook until the onions are very soft and caramelized, about 25 minutes.
3. Add 1 cup of the broth, bring to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer until the broth has evaporated and the onions are dry, about 5 minutes.
4. Discard the bay leaves and thyme sprigs. Dust the onions with the flour and give them a stir. Turn the heat down to medium low so the flour doesn't burn, and cook for 10 minutes to cook out the raw flour taste.
5. Now add the rest of the beef broth, bring the soup back to a simmer, and cook for 10 minutes.
6. Season to taste, with salt and pepper.
7. When you're ready to eat, preheat the broiler. Arrange the baguette slices on a baking sheet in a single layer. Sprinkle the slices with the Gruyere and broil until bubbly and golden brown, 3 to 5 minutes.
8. Ladle the soup in bowls and float several of the Gruyere croutons on top.
9. Alternative method: Ladle the soup into bowls, top each with 2 slices of bread and top with cheese. Put the bowls into the oven to toast the bread and melt the cheese.

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