How to Caramelize Onions

Geo Beats 2011-10-06

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How to Caramelize Onions - as part of the expert series by GeoBeats. I had like to show you how to do caramelized onions. Simple. How we do it at Rayuela, we use some dark rum and Pedro Ximénez so it has the spiciness of the rum and the sweetness of the Pedro Ximénez. So we are going to start with two onions, Spanish white onions. Make sure they are fresh. Make sure you use a very sharp knife because when you do so, you do not get water or you do not cry as they say. So, we peel the onion rather quick so we minimize the effect of the onions. The slice of the onion again is how you like. If you like it thick, it is fine and if you like it thinner it is fine too. The thinner that you cut it, the less time you have to give on the process of sautéing the onions. That is kind of medium. By the time I am finished with this, we can go at it. The idea for me is to start with the medium-high heat pan and than once the onions get translucent, then you can lower the heat. We are going to start with a little virgin olive oil and here we go with the onions. Make sure that they are loose, so each one of them gets the same amount of heat and they caramelize at the same time. We are going to keep doing this until it is translucent but at this time I like to add the Pedro Ximénez which is going to add more sweetness to the dish. One tip is that when you use alcohol, you have to remove your pan from the fire, because once you do it here, the heat can go to the pan and then it can bring that fire to the bottle and explode in your face. You do not want that, so remove it. This is the spicy rum. Me being from the Caribbean, rum, you cannot walk away from it. Then you can get the fire. Once the alcohol evaporates, then you can low the heat. We are going to keep it at a very, very low heat for about half an hour or 20 minutes. Again, it all depends on how thin you slice the onions. And here we are after 20-25 minutes with the low heat, the caramelized onions are perfect, the way I love it. We have a nice white plate. And as you know, the flavors in the onions are going to be plenty of spicy rum and Pedro Ximénez which is the rum gives the spiciness and the Pedro Ximénez adds a little more sweetness to it. I am going to finish it up with the reduction of balsamic and red wine, so it adds more consistency to what the traditional caramelized onions are. This is caramelized onions at Rayuela restaurant.

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