French Onion Soup Page

The overpowering taste of parmesean ruins this soup.  There’s emmentaler in there somewhere, but I would never have known.  The broth was decent.

Rating 6.5 out of 10

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Why didn’t anyone think of this sooner?  An onion soup with an optional glass of sherry on the side!  It’ll cost you two loonies, but it’s worth it.  The soup does stand on its own, but is enhanced even more by the addition of the glass you see in the picture.  Good quality swiss cheese, and full control of the sherry level makes for a great soup.

Rating 7.5 out of 10

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My friend Andrew and I were lured into this restaurant by a “barker” woman standing at the entrance.  Her whole presentation was based upon the fact that “the onion soup is to die for”.  Well, noting that some of my previous tastings that featured comté were very good, it was worth a try.  Well, not really.  The broth was bland and the cheese was gross.

Rating: 4.0 out of 10

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Awesome gruyere, and some of the best broth ever.  There was nothing negative to say about this soup.  Perhaps it’s their use of vidalia onions, or just the quality of the cheese…I don’t know.  It was simply spectacular.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10

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Located at the Fairmont in Banff Springs, Alberta, this German take on the French classic is interesting.  The cheese was absolutely delicious (combination of gruyere and emmentaler, just like in their fondue).  However, there was very little of it, as it was cut to fit the shape of the piece of bread.  The broth was also delicious, and very meaty.  It suffered the same problem, as there was only around a millimetre of it (that’s Canadian for “millimeter”, which is also Canadian for “very little”).  The bread you see in the picture is not floating.  You could really only get around 5 or 6 spoonfuls of broth.  Excellent ingredients, though!

Rating: 7.0 out of 10

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This is the third F.O.S. I’ve reviewed with a “puff pastry” on top (see Papillon and Christine Lee’s).  While I considered the others to be unique and still decent, this one does not “hold up” (in more ways than one).  The pastry was as good as the others, but there was no cheese to be found, at all.  I believe I could taste the remnants of cheese in the broth itself, but with nothing there to keep it on top of the soup, it was invisible.  So, rather than saying there was no cheese, I guess I’ll say that there was no cheese texture, and that by itself is unforgivable.

Rating: 4.0 out of 10

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Nice presentation, via the brass bowl right out of the oven.  However, the bowl is tiny, the cheese is extremely mild and hopelessly stuck to the bread.  The broth is also bland.  The cheese was so mild that I didn’t really believe it was gruyere.  I asked the server what it was, and he said, “provolone”.  I pointed out to him that the menu said gruyere.  He went back to the chef, and he still claimed gruyere.  In any case, not a stellar showing for this high end, highly rated steakhouse.

Rating: 4.0 out of 10

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I’ve always said that Daniel’s should serve onion soup.  I mean the place just “screams” for it.  I had assumed that if they were to add it on the menu, that they would do a great job, and I was right.  Added on 9/2/2009, it’s a veal stock soup, with three cheeses: Gruyere, Mozzarella, and Parmesan.  The broth has a good amount of sherry, which really works well with the stock.  This is a great addition to the already excellent choices at this restaurant, and to my F.O.S. favorites!

 Edit (10/02/09): Having had this several times now, I can say with some certainty that the mozzarella tastes very much like it is *smoked* mozarella.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10

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