Golden Onion Pie

There was a tie in last week’s poll so I went ahead and used some editorial powers to break the tie.  Shepard’s pie is good, but I was really intrigued by the golden onion pie recipe so I was glad to see it near the top and decided to give it the winning tie-breaker vote.

The idea of a pie made almost entirely of onions is kind of odd and Betsy will attest that it will make your entire house smell like onions for awhile.  So open some windows if you make this!  But the onions end up being very delicious and with a few other ingredients they form a really rich and almost sweet, but still savory, pie.

The crust for this pie is much more substantial than your normal crust for, say, an apple pie.  It’s a yeasted crust so you have to let it rise.  It’s also much easier to work with than a normal butter crust.

Golden Onion Pie (From Gourmet (RIP) Nov. 2009)
Makes 8-10 servings

Crust:
- 1 1/2 Teaspoons active dry yeast
- 1/3 Cup whole milk, warm (105-115 degrees F.)
- 1/4 Teaspoon sugar
- 2 Cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 Teaspoon salt
- 1 large egg
- 1/2 stick butter, melted

Filling:
- 4 large onions (3 1/2 pounds), sliced.  I used yellow onions.
- 6 ounces bacon, finely chopped
- 1/2 stick butter
- 1 Cup sour cream
- 2 large egg yolks
- Salt and Pepper

Helpful Equipment:
- Springform Pan

Making the Crust. The crust for this is pretty straightforward.  You’ll need these things:

To start, get your milk lukewarm (105-115 degrees) and mix in your sugar and yeast.  Let it sit for 5 minutes until the yeast begins to foam.  If for some reason your yeast doesn’t foam, you need new yeast!

Once it’s foaming, stir in your egg, melted butter, salt, and flour.  Stir everything until it comes together in a ball.  If you are using a mixer, mix this on medium with the paddle attachment for 3 minutes or so.  If you are using your hands (I’m a hands guy) then knead this on a clean surface for about 5 minutes.  It will be a pretty firm dough.

Sprinkle a bit of flour on top and return it to the bowl to rise for 2 hours or until it doubles in size.  To help it rise, cover the bowl with a damp, warm towel and keep it in a warm place.

Making the filling. As you can see, you’ll need a good amount of onions for this recipe.  I used 4 large onions.  You’ll need some bacon also!

As far as cutting the onions, I halved each onion, stem to stem, and then sliced each half into narrow strips.  This is the best way to create fairly even-sized onion slices.  As far as the bacon goes, chop it into tiny pieces.

To cook the filling you’ll need a good sized pot or pan with a lid.  Add your butter to the pan over medium heat and then add your bacon.  Cook your bacon for a few minutes until it is translucent (not crispy or it will burn later).  Then add all your onions at once!

Cook this, covered, for 20 minutes.  Stir it every 5 minutes or so just to make sure everything is cooking evenly.

After 20 minutes of covered cooking there will be a lot of liquid in the pan and we need to get rid of most of it.  So cook the onions for another 30 minutes uncovered.  This will really brown the onions nicely (although not as much as you would for like a french onion soup recipe).

Again, give them a stir every 5 minutes or so.

So after you’ve cooked the onions and bacon on medium heat for about 50 minutes, your house will smell delicious… as long as you consider onions to be delicious.  And if you don’t then why are you making this?!

Before we can do anything with these onions, they have to cool down to room temperature.  You’re going to need to let them cool for at least 30 minutes.  That’s okay though because our dough has to rise anyway during this time.

Finishing the filling. In a large bowl, whisk together your sour cream and egg yolks.  Once your onion mixture is cooled, add that to the party and stir it all together.  This is similar to making a custard.  If you don’t cool your onions down though, they will just cook your eggs right away and you’ll have scrambled onion eggs.  Not the best idea.

At this point, season your filling with a good pinch of salt and pepper.

Making the pie. On a lightly floured surface roll your dough out to a large circle.  The recipe says to roll it out to a 12 inch diameter circle but I did more like 15 inches and it seemed to fit my pan perfectly.  With 12 inches you might be cutting it a little close.

Then carefully transfer your crust to a springform pan.  Don’t worry.  If you don’t have a springform pan you can use a normal pie pan I think.  The springform just makes it easier to cut and serve later.  Plus it looks cool.

Regardless of what pan you choose, be sure to gently press the crust around all the edges.  You don’t want any air pockets.

Then pour in your filling and fold your crust over the top!  There should be a good amount of filling still showing in the center.  You don’t want it completely covered.

Baking the pie. This pie needs to bake for quite awhile.  I baked mine for about 80 minutes at 375 degrees.

For a bunch of onions in a pie crust, it turned out well I thought!

If you are serving this right away, let it cool for 15 minutes before cutting (if you have a springform pan you can take the pie out though as soon as you can handle it).

You can also store the pie in the fridge for a few days and just reheat it for about 30 minutes at 350 in the oven or (heaven forbid) you can reheat it a slice at a time in the microwave!

One great thing about this dish is I think it would work really well for either dinner or brunch.  I’ve eaten it for a few meals now and I really like it.  The onions are nice and caramelized and the crust is flaky and delicious.  It’s not really heavy, but it’s definitely filling.  If that makes any sense at all.

It’s a great dish for fall and will for sure feed a crowd!