Swiss-Onion Bread Ring

Cold snap. Single digits Tuesday through Thursday, the kind of Chicago cold that makes you angry at meteorology personally. Ryan went out for a structure fire on Tuesday night and came home at six in the morning smelling like wet smoke and exhaustion, his gear stiff with ice in spots. He sat at the kitchen table and ate a bowl of cereal in his Carhartts and then went and slept until noon. I left him a note: there is soup in the pot, eat the soup. He ate the soup.

The soup was a chicken and rice thing — rotisserie chicken from Costco shredded into a pot of broth with rice and carrots and a head of celery I needed to use up. Salt, pepper, a bay leaf, a glug of olive oil at the end. The kind of soup that's not a recipe so much as a list of things you had. I made a double batch because cold weeks are double-batch weeks.

The twins had a snow day Wednesday — daycare closed because the heat was out — so they came to school with me. Owen sat in my classroom corner with a stack of picture books and made them into a fort. Nora "helped" me reorganize the math manipulatives and put all the unifix cubes into one giant rainbow tower that took her twenty minutes and which she immediately knocked down on purpose with great satisfaction. My students adored them. Marcus held Nora's hand the entire morning meeting. Aaliyah read to Owen. It was the best worst day of work I've had in a while.

I started my spring class — a course on legal aspects of special education, which is exactly as thrilling as it sounds. The reading is dense. The professor writes long emails. I am doing this at the kitchen table at ten p.m. with a cup of decaf and the heat on too high. Ryan walked through the kitchen at eleven, kissed the top of my head, said "you got this," and went back to bed. I did not, in that moment, feel like I had it. But I read the chapter. That's the only thing that matters in master's programs at thirty: read the chapter. Tomorrow, read the next one.

The soup I described up there is really more of a habit than a recipe — it just happens when the temperature drops and I need something in the pot. But the one thing that makes it feel like an actual meal, the thing that makes Ryan sit down at the table instead of eating standing up over the sink, is having something to tear apart and dip into it. This Swiss-Onion Bread Ring has become that thing for us. It’s the kind of recipe that looks like you tried harder than you did, which is exactly the energy I have to work with at ten p.m. during a cold week when I’m also reading dense legal theory for a master’s class.

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 30 min | Total Time: 45 min | Servings: 10

Ingredients

2 tubes (16.3 oz each) refrigerated biscuit dough (such as Grands)
1 1/2 cups shredded Swiss cheese, divided
1 medium yellow onion, thinly sliced
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 tablespoon fresh parsley, chopped (for garnish, optional)

Instructions

Preheat and prep. Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease a 10-inch Bundt pan or tube pan generously with cooking spray and set aside.
Caramelize the onions. Melt 2 tablespoons of the butter in a skillet over medium-low heat. Add the sliced onion and cook, stirring occasionally, for 15–18 minutes until softened and golden. Add the garlic and cook 1 minute more. Remove from heat and stir in the Dijon mustard, Worcestershire sauce, thyme, salt, and pepper.
Make the butter mix. Melt the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter and set aside.
Assemble the ring. Separate the biscuit dough into individual rounds and cut each round into quarters. Toss the biscuit pieces in the melted butter, then toss with 1 cup of the Swiss cheese until coated. Layer half the biscuit pieces into the bottom of the prepared pan, spoon half the onion mixture over the top, then repeat with the remaining biscuit pieces and remaining onion mixture. Sprinkle the remaining 1/2 cup Swiss cheese over the top.
Bake. Bake uncovered for 28–32 minutes, until the top is deep golden brown and the center pieces are cooked through. A toothpick inserted in the center should come out clean.
Rest and invert. Let the ring cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then place a serving plate over the pan and carefully invert. Garnish with fresh parsley if desired. Serve warm and pull apart to eat.

Nutrition (per serving)

Swiss-Onion Bread Ring — Something Warm to Pull Apart on a Cold Week