• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • All Recipes
  • About
Occasionally Eggs

Occasionally Eggs

Healthy Vegetarian Recipes for Every Season

  • Cookbook
  • Contact
Staples

How to Make Caramelised Onions

December 17, 2020 by Alexandra Daum
Simple, if time consuming, caramelised onions are well worth the cooking time needed. Soft and sweet, they're an excellent addition to many savoury meals - these are finished with red wine.
Jump to Recipe
Red wine caramelised onions in a cast iron pan.

Caramelised onions are easy to make, but need a lot of time to cook. If you see someone telling you they’re caramelising onions and it takes 15 minutes, or half an hour, those are not caramelised onions! They are lightly cooked.

So yes, it’s very time consuming, but not very much active work. If you pop them on the stove and work on other things, just coming back to stir every once in a while, you won’t even notice the time. Slow and low cooking is always worthwhile.

Add these to any savoury dishes for a touch of sweetness and a more complex flavour. These leek and onion pasties are a good example, but you can make caramelised onion hummus, or add to simple pasta dishes, or more complex meals like a savoury mushroom wreath.

This is a basic recipe you’ll want to have in your back pocket.

Finished onions in a large cast iron pan.

Scroll to the bottom of the post or click “skip to recipe” above to see the recipe card with full ingredient measurements and instructions.

Ingredients

Caramelised Onions Ingredients.

Method

Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan over low heat. Halve and thinly slice the onions, then place them into the pan.

Raw onion slices added to the pan.

Cook, stirring occasionally, for about two hours. During this time the onions will slowly become translucent, then turn a light golden colour. They should reduce by at least half. If you see any browning, reduce the heat.

  • Onions about halfway through the cooking time.
  • Caramelised onions before the wine is added.

Once the onions have caramelised, add the salt and pepper. Stir to incorporate, then add the wine. Stir through, cook for another five minutes, then remove from the heat.

Use the onions as you’d like, or refrigerate for up to a week in an airtight container. Freeze up to one month.

Onions after the wine is added to the pan.

Tips and Notes

Caramelised onions freeze surprisingly well. I often make extra and freeze portions in airtight containers for later use, and recommend this, as it’s such a time consuming process.

Adding the wine (or balsamic vinegar) at the end of the cooking time deglazes the pan. This lifts all the delicious savoury bits that may have stuck to the pan during cooking and makes the onions much easier to remove. Win win.

It’s important to cook the onions on a really low temperature, and they should not be browning. Patience is the most important element.

Some people add a bit of sugar or honey to the onions to speed up the process slightly, which you can do, but I never bother.

Don’t worry about crowding the pan when you first add the onions. They’ll cook down significantly, as you can see above – my pan was overfilled and heaped over the edges when the onions were first added.

Red wine caramelised onions in a cast iron pan.

Substitutions

If you don’t drink wine or have it in the house, balsamic vinegar is an ideal sub here. Replace the full amount of wine with one tablespoon of balsamic vinegar. Apple cider vinegar works too.

Red, yellow, and white onions can all be used interchangeably. Shallots are good too (but more expensive).

More Staple Recipes

Pickled Red Onions
Vegetable Broth
Spelt Pasta
Oat Milk
Whole Egg Mayonnaise

Let’s connect! For more OE, follow along on Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest, purchase the Occasionally Eggs cookbook, or subscribe for new posts via email. If you make this recipe, I’d love to see! Tag your instagram versions with @occasionallyeggs.

Caramelised Onions

Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 2 hours
Total Time 2 hours 5 minutes
5 from 2 votes

Ingredients

Metric – American
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • 4 medium onions about 600g or 1 1/4 lb.
  • ½ teaspoon sea salt
  • ½ teaspoon black pepper
  • 60 ml dry red wine

Instructions

  • Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan over low heat. Halve and thinly slice the onions, then place them into the pan.
  • Cook, stirring occasionally, for about two hours. During this time the onions will slowly become translucent, then turn a light golden colour. They should reduce by at least half. If you see any browning, reduce the heat.
  • Once the onions have caramelised, add the salt and pepper. Stir to incorporate, then add the wine. Stir through, cook for another five minutes, then remove from the heat.
  • Use the onions as you’d like, or refrigerate for up to a week in an airtight container. Freeze up to one month.

Notes

If you don’t drink wine or have it in the house, balsamic vinegar is an ideal sub for the red wine. Replace the full amount of wine with one tablespoon of balsamic vinegar.

Nutrition

Serving: 1g Calories: 34kcal Carbohydrates: 4g Protein: 1g Fat: 1g Polyunsaturated Fat: 1g Sodium: 107mg Fiber: 1g Sugar: 2g
© Alexandra Daum
Course: Pantry Recipes
Cuisine: European
Print

Newsletter

Sign up for weekly updates and subscriber-only recipes.

More Staples:

Top down view of pumpkin puree in a jar.How to Make Pumpkin Puree
Cashew cream cheese spread onto toasted bagels.Fermented Cashew Cream Cheese
Baked crackers topped with edible flowers and herbs, cut into small squares.Sourdough Rye and Spelt Crackers
Finished coconut butter being moved with a spatula in the mixer.How to Make Coconut Butter

Previous Post: « Vegan Chocolate Truffles with Ginger and Orange
Next Post: Savoury Mushroom and Caramelised Onion Wreath »

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recipe Rating




This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

About Alexandra
Recipes
FAQ
Contact
Work With Me
Site Credits

STAY IN CONTACT
get weekly updates, exclusive recipes, and more

   

Get the cookbook

© 2022 Occasionally Eggs | Images and text may not be used without permission | Privacy Policy