Well, there went yer diet. French onion soup taste so good for a reason. Inspired by you, I have been on an 800 calorie a day diet since leaving a terrific cook in dixie. It will increase now that I have done some shopping.

Lol, well one bowl of it isn’t going to kill me, especially considering it’s all I have eated today and it was a small bowl at that. I am guessing it’s the cheeses that you are referring to that make it a high calorie dish - I don’t see onions and bread as anything to high on the calorie content and definitely there are no fat calories in onions. I had one nice bowl with a lot of cheese, the rest of it will be more of the soup and bread and very little cheese, that should cut down the calories by quite a lot.
I would say that 800 calories a day is a very strict diet, no?

Yup. It was what I went to when I would plateau on my diet of 1,000 calories a day and would lose patience with the weight loss stopping. I don’t stay on it long, but as I’ve said, stomach shrinks and am not hungry much, except bedtime which I have learned to ignore.

From the web:

Amount per Serving
Calories 561 Calories from Fat 162
% Daily Value *
Total Fat 18g 28%
Saturated Fat 0g 0%
Sodium 0mg 0%
Total Carbohydrate 54g 18%
Dietary Fiber 5g 20%
Protein 22g 44%

Interesting. I’ll have to remember that on the plateaus myself. I found all kinds of different caloric contents for french onion soup from less than 100 calories to almost 1,000.
So, I’ll break it down:
1 medium yellow onion has 64 calories, claiming 1 calorie from fat.
That’s pretty much nothing, as I expected.

I used French breadk - a couple of sites say 92 to 115 calories, so I’ll call it 105 calories for a small slice - I didn’t use much of this, either. So, let’s say my bowl of french onion soup is now up to 200 calories to be safe.

A cup of beef broth has 29 calories, a cup of chicken broth has 12, the recipe has both in it. The other ingredients are water, a bay leaf, a very small amount of butter, pepper.

Now, the real calories are in the cheese, there’s no doubt about it:
78 calories in one ounce/slice of mozzarella
105 calories in one ounce of monterey jack and
110 calories in fontina cheese - I used all 3 in the first bowl.

I’m figuring I ate a minimum of 400 calories worth of cheese. Without it, that bowl of french onion soup with the french bread - no more than 250 calories, probably less cause’ I’m eating small bowls of it. I added no salt, though I expect the broths have sodium in them. I am also watching sodium intake.

The soup tastes good without the cheese - not AS good, obviously, but still.

Although another good trick is NOT to weigh yourself constantly [same time every time preferably first thing in day] I’ll go ahead and ask — how much have you lost?

I’m just shy of 9 pounds since I started, which ain’t too shabby considering I haven’t been doing this very long.

Hi Ben, obviously you are on Facebook. I haven’t kept a blog since JS went down, but I do keep current with Facebook. Add me if you like! Janet Steinberg

Take Care!

Hi Janet!
Long time no see!
I sent an invitation through Facebook wall.

I absolutely LOVE French Onion soup, but have never cooked it myself. Other people’s cooking tastes so much better anyways.