This easy, comforting soup is a surefire crowd-pleaser that's perfect for family dinners, cozy nights in, or any occasion when you want to enjoy a warm and delicious meal.
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🗝️ Key takeaways
- Simple ingredients that are budget friendly plus it doesn't require red wine like a traditional French onion soup recipe.
- Perfect for those first chilly nights in the fall! Since it's slow-cooked it's great for busy weeknights and back to school.
- You don't miss the rich flavor of the wine because long, slow cooking time develops maximum flavor with minimum effort.
This Crockpot French Onion Soup is made with a few simple ingredients and a lot of love. It's perfect for chilly nights or when you want to enjoy a delicious and hearty meal without spending hours in the kitchen.
Crockpot French onion soup combines flavorful caramelized onions and hearty, beefy broth into an irresistibly easy meal.
Topped with gooey cheese and served with a slice of French bread, this delicious soup is good for the soul!
🧾 Ingredients
This is an overview of the ingredients. You'll find the full measurements and instructions in the green recipe card (printable) at the bottom of the page.
📖 Variations
- Yellow onions give the soup a deliciously balanced onion flavor. However, you can swap them out for sweet onions, white onions, or shallots, or use a combination of everything! Just avoid red onions.
- Make it vegetarian by using a mushroom or onion broth. (Vegetable broth doesn't have the same deep flavor, so it doesn't work as well.)
- Beef stock is traditional but you can lighten this recipe up by using chicken broth.
- Feel free to use homemade broth if you have some in your pantry or freezer.
- While a French baguette is most traditional with French onion soup, you can use any kind of carb you like. Heartier, crusty bread holds up the best on top of your soup bowl.
- Swap the bread with homemade croutons or store-bought crunchy baguette toast slices.
- Use smoky provolone instead of regular for even more depth of flavor.
- Not a fan of provolone? Swap it with shredded Swiss cheese.
- If you prefer your slow-cooker French onion soup a little cheesier, stir in some grated parmesan cheese.
- Have some herbs to use up? Adding a few sprigs of fresh thyme elevates the flavor! (Dried thyme or Italian seasoning works in a pinch, too.)
🔪 Instructions
This is an overview of the instructions. Full instructions are in the green recipe card at the bottom of the page.
- Add the onions, garlic, butter, and seasoning to the slow cooker. Heat on high for one hour.
- Pour in the beef stock and continue cooking on low for 6-7 hours.
- Ladle soup into ovenproof bowls and place on a baking sheet.
- Top each bowl with a slice of bread and cheese. Bake for 10 minutes.
Love French onion soup? Give these French onion meatballs a try! It's an easy 20 minute recipe with just 3 ingredients!
🥫 Storage
You don't have to run out to a cafe to enjoy good French onion soup for lunch. This homemade, slow-cooked version makes seriously delicious leftovers.
Store the cooled soup in an airtight container—be sure to leave the bread slices and cheese off. Refrigerated, the leftovers will keep for about three days.
Three days not long enough? Good news! This homemade French onion soup recipe freezes great! Portion it into freezer-safe containers and store for up to three months.
Let the soup thaw in the refrigerator, or speed up the process using the microwave. Then, reheat it to simmering perfection either on the stovetop or again in the microwave.
💭 Things to know
Expert Tip: If you don't have oven-safe bowls, place the bread slices on a cookie sheet. Top them with the cheese and bake. Then, carefully use a spatula to place each piece of cheesy bread on top of the soup.
- Don't skip steps. Cooking the onions with butter (without broth) allows them to caramelize. This gives your French onion soup its flavor!
- Adding a pinch of brown sugar helps the onions caramelize a bit more. However, this does sweeten the soup so proceed cautiously!
- If you want, you can caramelize your onions in a large skillet over low heat on the stovetop. This process can take around 45 minutes, though, so that's why I prefer to let the crockpot do the work!
- Cheese goes from golden brown to burnt within seconds, so watch it carefully under the broiler.
- The 6-8 hour setting on low helps all the flavors develop perfectly. If you really need to, though, you can get away with cooking it for 3-4 hours on high.
👩🍳 FAQs
It tastes better than classic French onion soup! If you're not familiar, the finished product is a flavorful, earthy broth made mostly from soft sliced onions. It's almost always accompanied by some type of bread and lots of cheese.
Any good melty cheese! Provolone is great—not only is it super delicious, but it's generally easy to find (and cheap to buy!) from grocery stores. If you want to splurge, gruyere cheese adds a beautiful, sharp flavor to the soup. Swiss works well, too.
Nope, it's an easy French onion soup recipe, so we make it without alcohol. You can add a splash of sherry or white wine if you want, but, truthfully, you can't even tell it's missing! (Some people like to add Worcestershire sauce as a non-alcoholic option, too.)
You absolutely can! French onion soup is a great freezer meal to have on hand. In an airtight container, it'll keep in the freezer for up to three months.
They're similar in some ways—mainly, the caramelized onions. However, English onion soup uses either beef, chicken, or vegetable broth as well as different kinds of cheese and herbs.
📚 Related recipes
- Easy French Onion Chicken Casserole is inspired by the classic soup, but made into a hearty, feeds-the-whole-family pasta dinner!
- Budget-friendly and easy to stretch, Spicy Crockpot Lentil Soup is a filling and unique dinner idea that will warm up the chilliest of nights.
- Crockpot French Onion Chicken only requires five ingredients. It's a simple slow-cooker dinner and a great way to use up chicken breasts!
- Another favorite crockpot soup recipe, Chicken Fajita Soup is full of Southwest flavor and so, so easy to make. You'll love it!
🍽️ Serve with...
Homemade French onion soup works best as a simple meal without a lot of extras. I like to serve it with a crispy salad and some bread. These yeast-based Homemade Baguettes taste straight out of a French bakery and are a great texture for dipping in soup.
It may not be French but I don't think you can go wrong with homemade chocolate pudding for dessert, either!
🥄 Restless Chipotle recommends
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📞 The last word
I love recipes like this!
Simply toss everything in your slow cooker and let it cook until the onions are caramelized and the broth is rich and flavorful. To finish, top each serving with a thick slice of crusty bread and a generous amount of melted Gruyere cheese.
If you click on the number of servings in the recipe card you can adjust the measurements up or down for the exact number of servings you need. Don't forget that you can click on "add to collection" to save it to your own, private recipe box!
If you love this recipe please give it 5 stars! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
📖 Recipe
Crock Pot French Onion Soup
Print Pin Recipe SaveEquipment Needed
Ingredients
- 3 pounds yellow onions, peeled and cut into quarters
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 4 tablespoons butter, melted
- 2-3 teaspoons kosher salt, adjust for your preference
- ½ teaspoon black pepper, ground
- 64 ounces beef broth, 2 containers
- 1 baguette, sliced and toasted
- Provolone Cheese
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Instructions
- Spray the inside of the slow cooker with no-stick cooking spray.
- Peel and quarter onions. Mince garlic.
- Add the onions, garlic, butter, salt, and pepper.
- Cover and cook on high for 1 hour, until the onions have started to soften.
- Add the beef broth, set the crockpot to low, cover and cook for 6-7 hours.
- During the last 20-30 minutes, preheat the oven to 350* Fahrenheit.
- Portion the soup into oven safe bowls, placed on a rimmed baking sheet.
- Top each bowl with slices of toasted baguette and provolone cheese.
- Bake for about 10 minutes, or until the cheese is completely melted.
- Switch the oven to broil and broil until the cheese is bubbly and browned, about a minute or two (watch closely so you don’t burn the cheese).
- Serve immediately and enjoy!
Notes
- If you don't have oven-safe bowls, place the bread slices on a cookie sheet. Top them with the cheese and bake. Then, carefully use a spatula to place each piece of cheesy bread on top of the soup.
- Don't skip steps. Cooking the onions with butter (without broth) allows them to caramelize. This gives your French onion soup its flavor!
- Adding a pinch of brown sugar helps the onions caramelize a bit more. However, this does sweeten the soup so proceed cautiously!
- If you want, you can caramelize your onions in a large skillet over low heat on the stovetop. This process can take around 45 minutes, though, so that's why I prefer to let the crockpot do the work!
- Cheese goes from golden brown to burnt within seconds, so watch it carefully under the broiler.
- The 6-8 hour setting on low helps all the flavors develop perfectly. If you really need to, though, you can get away with cooking it for 3-4 hours on high.
Nutrition Facts
Nutrition information is estimated as a courtesy. If using for medical purposes, please verify information using your own nutritional calculator. Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.
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We'll never share your email or send you spam. Pinkie swear.First published March 4, 2023. Last updated to add more helpful information August 2, 2023.
✍🏻 A note from Marye...
I know y'all don't always like the stories bloggers tell so when I have one I try to put it at the very bottom so you can read or skip as you like.
I have always loved French onion soup. There's something about lifting up that gooey cheesy layer and being hit right in the olfactory nerves with the aroma of caramelized onion and heaven.
So, it should not be a surprise to find out that when I finally traveled to Paris (after a lifetime of dreaming) that the first thing I ate was a bowl of French onion soup at a little cafe called Le Petit Poucet.
That's translated as the little thumb - Tom Thumb.
It was beyond words. Full of caramelized onions and topped with a thick slice of baguette that had been pushed down into the bowl so that the broth was soaked up into it.
On top of that was a ½ thick slab of melted cheese that made it almost impossible to eat without using my fingers to break the cheese strings arching from the bowl to my mouth.
It was incredible.
Is this soup in the same league? Honesty, no. It's not.
Our ingredients are much different than those in Europe. BUT this soup is absolutely delicious and it's super easy, too.
...But if you ever get to Paris - Le Petit Poucet. Tell 'em I said hi.
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