Caramelised Onion Chutney
Caramelised Onion Chutney is one of those sublime accompaniments to good cheese even though there isn't a gram of meat or animal produce involved. It is, as a dwarf might say, food fit for an elf (not always a compliment to the elf).
The recipe is pretty simple. It's onions and flavours and sugar and vinegar. Whilst not wanting to offend any purists, this recipe has gone for a touch of clove, not everyone's favourite spice but you should give it a go unless you have an allergy to cloves. If you must, you can substitute with other preferred spices but don't forget that this is an onion chutney after all. You can use other vinegars and malt or wine might help it keep longer than balsamic but that is your choice.
You will need some clean sterilised sized jars to make this all worthwhile and to enable you to keep the product for a while ( if you can). This recipe makes about 6 jars.
Ingredients
- 10-12 red onions - see method
- 1 large red chilli
- 2 bay leaves
- 25ml olive oil
- 300g soft brown sugar)
- 400ml (cheapish) balsamic vinegar
- 0.5 tsp ground cloves
- 1 tsp chilli
- 1 tsp salt
Method
Peel and slice the onions thinly until you have 800g of sliced onions.
Remove the seeds and slice the chilli into small thin strips.
Add oil, onions, chilli and bay leaves to a large pan and cook on a slow heat until the onions are brown and sticky (about 40 minutes or so if in the bottom of an Aga).
Then add the sugar, vinegar clove and salt and simmer for about 30 minutes until the chutney is thick and dark
Remove the bay leaves.
Pour into hot sterilised jars and close up whilst still hot.
Leave for about four weeks before using but this is more for maturing flavour and not health reasons!
Observations
The taste is great. Hot with a hint of clove behind it, sweet and malty and with the texture of the onions.
I think there is too much vinegar in the recipe as the resultant chutney was quite wet. I don't think that it will spoil the delivery of the chutney but I think that I will use only 300 ml of vinegar next time.
It was a bit of a challenge to get the onions to caramelise in the bottom Aga and so I put them on the top for about 10 minutes after half an our in the oven.
Source: The Book of Dwarf here.
