French Onion Soup

I heart french onion soup. I had it for the first time when I was a poor college student working as a server at Outback Steakhouse (tip your server friends!). I never would have thought that I was the type to like french onion soup, I mean, it's onion soup for goodness sakes. That's weird. But then I tried it. And it was so rich and savory, I fell in love. Up until this point I had never attempted to make my own french onion soup, I had deemed it one of those things that I have to eat at a restaurant to enjoy. But this soup is suprisingly good and relatively easy, if you don't mind thinly slicing FIVE onions. Lance and I had to take onion slicing shifts to prep this soup. And both of us could still smell the pungent fumes in our noses even after we had went to bed. If you had a mandolin slicer, this would come in very handy and would greatly speed up the process. And perhaps would save your eyes. I will say this: french onion soup is to be enjoyed in small, managable quanities. Not in a large crockpot-esk vat. We froze the majority of this soup to be enjoyed at a later time. It's a bit rich to have mutiple bowls of it at a time.

Crockpot French Onion Soup - by Sandra Lee
Ingredients
5 small onions, thinly sliced
2 cans (14 ounces) low sodium beef broth (recommended: Swanson's)
2 cans (10 ounces) beef consomme (recommended: Campbell's)
1 packet onion soup mix (recommended: Lipton's)
8 slices French bread, about 1 inch thick
1 cup shredded Gruyere
Directions
Combine onions, broth, consomme, and soup mix in a slow cooker. Cook on HIGH setting for 4 hours, or LOW setting for 8 hours.

Ladle soup into serving bowls. Top with a slice of French bread. Sprinkle 2 tablespoons cheese over each bread slice. Put soup bowls under broiler until cheese is melted. Alternatively, place the bread on a baking sheet and top with cheese; broil until cheese has melted, about 30 to 40 seconds, and set on top just before serving.