Dark, rich, onion soup needn’t be laborous

Few soups get people as misty-eyed as French onion.

Sure, I count myself among the many who cry while slicing pounds and pounds of onions.

Despite the waterworks, it’s hard to resist the result: a rich, fragrant, deeply colored pot of comfort. The best renditions are so beautiful, they might bring a tear to your eye — at least metaphorically.

That’s the kind of recipe included today. Even better, this Fast French Onion Soup from J. Kenji Lopez-alt, kitchen wizard and Serious Eats chief culinary adviser, is speedier than a traditional preparation, and it doesn’t sacrifice flavor in the interest of time.

His method, which I culled from his impressive 2015 cookbook, “The Food Lab,” uses sugar, baking powder and increased heat to speed up the onion caramelization process. “Like velvet” was one taster’s observation of the soup. The deeply caramelized onions created such a rich, dark liquid that it prompted some to wonder whether the soup had been made with beef broth.

No. I got stunning results using a good storebought chicken broth.

“The broth is very important,” Lopez-alt said, but that doesn’t mean you have to abandon the prospect of French onion soup at home if you don’t have homemade broth. If you do, great. If not, I’m not sure you would be able to tell the difference there, either, when the onions do so much of the work for you.

Cooking the onions at a higher temperature requires a bit more hands-on work because you have to make sure you aren’t burning them or the flavorful browning on the