Les Poissonchats

Rich, creamy and comforting, that’s exactly what I need now. It has been awfully cold out here, overcast days that make one sleepy, thin foggy rain pouring from all directions including bottom up. We play bistrot today, pretending we just ended up in a small French town, hungry and weary, and happily sitting down in a corner at a small table, waiters rushing busily back and forth and a loud chatter of voices, a little crowded and very warm and comfortable. Just the way we remember from the times before our lives have been restricted, when we stopped in a town up north for a night at the opera.

What you’ll need

• One big onion
• A large spoonful of flour
• A large spoonful of fresh butter
• A sip of dry white wine
• 4dl fresh milk
• 1dl fresh cream
• Grated nutmeg
• Sea salt
• White pepper, ground
• Grated cheese, gruyere or conté
• Slices of fresh bread

How to cook it

Preheat the oven with the grill function at maximum temperature. 

Chop the onion into thin slices and brown with the flour in butter at low temperature. Deglaze with a tiny sip of white whine and reduce for one minute. Add milk, cream, salt, pepper and nutmeg and bring on the heat until it cooks. 

In soup bowls, place a slice of bread at the bottom and generously sprinkle with cheese. Add the soup and place another slice of bread on the top that you generously sprinkle with grated cheese. Grill for 5minutes, serve immediately. 

How to eat it

Hot and steaming and a glass of vin jaune or, if not available sherry, does capitally on a bleak day.