Bloomin' Onion

So, here's the fried onion recipe some of us have been mentioning. (Keith and Jenni and family were here the first time we made these, so she helped me lots!)

Dipping Sauce: 

1/2 cup mayonnaise

2 tsp. ketchup

2 Tbsp. creamy horseradish

1/4 tsp. paprika

1/4 tsp. salt

1/8 tsp. oregano

dash pepper

Stir all together and chill awhile, the longer the better. Even days is great.

Batter:

1 beaten egg

1 cup milk

whisk together in medium sized bowl.

In separate bowl combine: 

1 cup flour

1.5 tsp. salt

1.5 tsp. cayenne pepper

1 tsp. paprika

1/2 tsp. pepper

1/4 tsp. oregano

1/8 tsp. thyme

1/8 tsp. cumin

1 Jumbo Sweet Onion (prepared as follows)

Slice off 3/4 inch from top and bottom of onion, remove skin. Cut 1 inch diameter core from centre of onion. (I used an apple corer thingy, but you don't want one that cuts the apple into wedges while it cores the apple!) Cut whole thing in wedges but stop knife about 3/4 of the way through the onion, so it is still in tact on bottom. Cut it approximately 16 times (Like a pie in lots of very small wedges) or less if your onion is not a truly Jumbo in size. To help separate petals, plunge the onion into boiling water for 1 minute and then immediately into cold water. (Keep onion upright as much as possible, although you may have to tip it slightly to drain the cold water out.)

Dip onion into egg and milk mixture, then into powder, then back into egg and milk mixture and then into the powder again. (Keep onion upright) Separate petals as necessary to get coating in between the wedges. (I used a spoon to pour the spices down into the petals.) Put on plate and let rest in fridge 15 minutes.

Meanwhile heat oil to 350*. Use enough oil to cover onion totally. (I use my deep fryer.) Fry right side up for about 10 minutes. Remove from oil and drain in fryer basket or on paper towels.

Eat with the dip. (duh) =) 

Now, I found this to be a bit of a hassle, to be honest. Some of the onions wanted to fall apart on me, but I went ahead and fried the part that stayed together and then fried all the "pieces" last. We all liked the onions but not many were crazy about the sauce. I thought it tasted better the next week when the flavours had really blended. 

I had 2 more sweet onions left so several weeks later I decided to make onion rings with this batter and see if that would be any less hassle. IT WAS!! and it still had the same great flavour. I started off doing the double dipping thing into the separate wet and dry bowls, but soon just mixed the two together to make a thick liquid batter and that worked superbly. I did notice two things though, the crispness was best when they were quite hot and got a little bit less-crisp as it sat on the plate. (Not really soggy, just not as crunchy.) I didn't notice this when we used the double dip method the first time. But then we were eating them as fast as they were fried so maybe that's not a good comparison. I also thought they were a bit more grease laden with the mixed batter as opposed to the double dipped ones. 

So I guess you can chose ye this day for thyselves which method thou shalt use to fry thine own sweet onion.