Cheesy Onion Casserole: Best Thanksgiving Side Dish Ever!

No Thanksgiving is complete without a casserole and this one is literally as easy to make as it is to eat. With only a few ingredients and 30 minutes cooking time, it can easily be made between all the other more complicated Thanksgiving dishes.

Thanksgiving is a day of total hedonism where we gorge ourselves silly and have enough left overs for an army! Cheesy Onion Casserole, a family favorite, is so delicious the left overs are always fought over and we have to evenly and judiciously distribute or else the army is at war.

-Forkable Blog

Step 1 Ingredients

2-3 Tbs butter or margarine
3 large sweet onions or 4 medium white or yellow onions
2 c. shredded Swiss cheese (8 oz.)
1 can cream of chicken soup, undiluted**
2/3 c. milk
1 tsp. soy sauce
8 or so slices of French bread

**You can substitute cream of mushroom soup for cream of chicken to make vegetarian.

Comments

[StiltGuyJoe]

Made it, everyone loved it. Thanks for the recipe. :)

[roxolsen]

I highly recommend preparing and cooking this outdoors. I will use my electric frying pan next time. The whole house smelled of onions for hours!
LOVED THE RESULTS!

[NotDaMomma]

lookin 4 easy recipes & ran across this. just had 2 make small sample. friend said he didn't know onions tasted so good now got 2 make it 4 family Thanksgiving.

[watermelonhead]

HOLY CRAP that looks good!

[StudioAfterlife]

I made this for thanksgiving. My family thought it was the weirdest thing. Half wouldn't try it, most didn't like it. Me, my daughter, and an aunt absolutely loved it... I'm actually craving some right now... =o/

The cheesy garlic butter biscuits from www.instructables.com/id/How-to-Make-Savory-Garlic-Butter-Cheddar-Biscuits/ are perfect with it.

[Aronbao]

it looks delicious

[crapulence]

Hi Forkable! I made this for Thanksgiving and everyone loved it!  Very delicious! It did come out a little soupy, but next time I would use a condensed cream of mushroom/chicken soup (i used a non condensed cream of mushroom soup), I think that would thicken it up a bit.  Thanks again for an awesome recipe....a definite keeper! :o)  

[irish2danish]

 I did make this for Thanksgiving and it was a big hit! Too big a hit -- no leftovers for me! It tasted great though I thought it was a little soupy -- like I had added too much milk or didn't bake it long enough or maybe didn't cut the bread slices thick enough? I'll make this again for Christmas dinner. Thanks so much for posting this!

[1cardcreator]

Just had to come back and say I made this dish and it was awesome!  Thank you for sharing the recipe!  ~Diane

[afalconfan]

Excellent! It was a hit with my family. Used a 3 quart dish and 2 cups of milk (that was ample) and cut the bread in smaller pieces (more bite size).I used more cheese but then what dish couldn't use more cheese. My wife says do it again!

[dulciquilt]

would it be overkill to use cream of onion soup?

[Forkable]

Woah!  I don't know.  There's only one way to find out...

[irish2danish]

This looks yummy! I was looking for a new veggie-based dish to bring for Thanksgiving dinner. I love onions and it also looks fool-proof so I won't worry about trying to make it once before T-Day. Thanks!

[reggierhy]

This looks very interesting. I am not sure if it is appealing or appalling! But I think i am going to find out. This could be particularly useful to those of us who have to watch our carbs as this looks like it would make a nice substitution for au gratin potatoes. It is a lot of onions although i guess it would not be much different from French onion soup which i do love. So i am going to try this today, although i might substitute muenster cheese. I will let you know what we think. Thanks for the idea, it is very creative and different from anything I have seen in a while.

[thisbirdsabsurd]

 It does look delicious but I wouldn't count on it be lower in carbs than potatoes!  All that bread will make up for that!  ;)

[Dantron]

 Is it possible to do this in a crock pot? I have a 4 quart that my girlfriend and I use and put on while away at classes. Perhaps cooking the onions first then mixing and adding the other ingredients?

[mackamitsu]

good stuff,  we deleted the soy sauce, and bread, and added garlic croutons. My kids ate it up, and they aren't big onion fans.

[hitokiri_808]

Looks awesome.

[reggierhy]

As promised earlier this month, I tried the recipe tonight, although with great trepidation, fully prepared to be let's just say unsatisfied. I was in for a big surprise! This was actually pretty damn good! Even my picky husband thought so after he got his brain wrapped around the idea that it was an onion casserole dish. He insisted it was meat, then potatoes, and finally he accepted it as it was and enjoyed it. I guess we just aren't used to the idea of eating onions as a dish (ahem unless they are battered and deep fried--that is one heck of a meal!) We loved it. i only had Italian blend shredded cheese in the house although i can see how it would be good with Swiss and i found some little Italian loaf rondelles already toasted in the bakery and it was so good. Thanks for introducing us to this new idea.

[paperclip32]

 so if i substitute the mushroom soup for the chicken one,i'll make a vegertarian?wow.

[Forkable]

yes.  It is just that simple!

[paperclip32]

 oh.thanks then.

[l8nite]

Being the only one in my family to really appreciate onions I saw this and had to try it !  I used 3 large spanish onions, a combination of swiss and pepper jack cheese, cream of shrimp soup and pumpernicol/rye swirl bread.  The substitutes where because thats what was in the pantry.
 The anticapation as it cooked and then cooled enough to eat was almost unbearable and then I got to eat it... the superlatives have not yet been coined to express my delight and FYI.. this is almost better cold !

[craftinsusan]

I made this for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and now here I am, finding the recipe again (don't know where I put the printout) in June! I have a lot of onions right now, and am going to a potluck. I will try making it right before I head out the door so it will stay warm. I also used some homemade bread on it once (sliced thick) with garlic butter on top. YUM!

[rosiegirll]

I would never make a comment about a recipe unless I tried it. It's a waste of everyone's time. So, I decided to try this casserole tonight. You see, I have 41 years of married experience cooking. Before that I assisted my mother in cooking for a family of eight. I know a good recipe when I see one!!!!!! Upfront, I could see that Forkable had a good one on her hands. Tonight I cooked it for dinner and this recipe is to die for! My husband sprinkled some parmesean cheese on top as if you were eating French Onion Soup and I used some of the Red Robin Restaurant seasoning on mine(Red Robin Restaurants are only in the West of the USA, I believe.) This recipe is going to be a staple for us I am sure. Good Job Forkable11..My new best friend!:-) One thought occurred to me... I placed the casserole dish on the lower end of my oven. You should place it up higher so the french bread browns. You want it crunchy. Also,it might be a bit of overkill for Thanksgiving due to the fact that both this recipe and the dressing would have bread in them but I'd make this for any other meal. My hubby and I ate seconds and we only touched about 1/3 of this as a main dish and we spent about $13.00 for ingredients. It would be economical if you are watching your $$. To would make this for a main dish, just add a can of chicken or chicken leftover from a baked chicken. Any way you try it this basic recipe is one of the best I've ever had. Thanks Forkable!

[Raventoo]

Friendly FYI re: Red Robin only in the West U.S.A. - We have Red Robin Restaurants here in Michigan, so they must be spreading Eastward. I'll have to check out their seasoning - thanks for the tip! :-)

[Tendrop]

Very excellent recipe, common ingredients (although you might not have French bread just lying around the house), easy preparation, quick cooking time, and extremely delicious! The only issue was that the French bread didn't brown enough, but that may just be the oven that I used, or the French bread that I bought. 4.5/5!

[ksparks]

Excellent! To make as a main dish, I would put in a large can of chicken (although the phrase "can of chicken" sounds wrong)... Thanks!

[canida]

I'm adding this one to the Thanksgiving spreadsheet this year! A heart-stopping substitute for the roasted fennel nobody ate last year.

I think we'll do the veggie version with some extra sauteed shiitakes.

[canida]

We skipped the shiitakes due to laziness, but the whole thing went fast anyway. Meant to take a picture, but by that time it was a mostly-empty dish! Thanks for the recipe.

[craftinsusan]

This is AWESOME! YUM! It is like a creamy french onion soup-casserole-ish dish. The second time I made it, I put garlic butter on the bread, so there was built-in garlic toast. The soy sauce adds a salty taste, so I imagine that is why there is only pepper added.

[dswitzer1]

Heartile recommend this one -- I tried it and everyone loved it -- except for the anti-onion crowd of course!

[RugbySteve]

Just made this for a vegetarian pot luck. It was a hit, I loved it and so did everyone else. I made it with cream of asparagus instead of chicken.

[dfairbairn82]

What about adding sprinkles of bacon? Have you ever tried that? I might try it for Thxgiving.

[martynbiker]

Mmmmmmmmmmmm Sounds Delicious! I make something similar but with LEEKS instead of Onions ( mainly because i used to live next to a guy that grew 1000's of leeks and I got em free) and I add a spoonfull of dry English Mustard Powder to the near exact same recipe as yours, plus a good grind of Black pepper. I love getting variations of recipes! Well Done!

[trailleadr]

I want to cry.... (no pun intended with the onions) My wife and kids don't like onions, and that looks really good!! It would be a real stretch to try and get this on the table without getting looks, and attitude about it being next to the stuffing. "Because you know those onion cooties get all over the other food." lol Yes, I have a weird family.

[Forkable]

My good friend's boyfriend doesn't eat onions either and we are always conspiring how to make food without onions. Its really hard. Kudos.

[tsvlasuk]

Is the flavor of the finished product affected by using sweet onions vs yellow vs white? Or does the cooking minimize the difference in their flavor?

[Forkable]

cooking does minimize the flavor of the yellow/white onions. I like it best with sweet onions, but the difference is quite negligible, and the casserole in the photos are made with white onions because it was all I could get at my corner market.

[tsvlasuk]

Okay, thanks. I'm going to try this this year!