[Decker12]

Hi guys, I checked around the forum for an answer to this question but was having trouble with the search engine.. so hopefully this question hasn't been answered before over and over again!

I have a fairly new Le Crueset dutch over, the large oval one, think it's 6 quarts? Last night, I was making the Cook's Illustrated French Onion Soup, which requires me to melt some butter and then reduce 3lbs of thinly cut red onions. I've made this recipe before in a standard non-stick dutch oven but I the Le Crueset is bigger and I was hoping the steady even heat would help the onions get nice and browned and sticky, faster.

Soup turned out great, problem is, there's this awful black char literally fused to the bottom of the enameled pot. The onions weren't burnt at all. The soup had no burnt taste in it. I have tried everything to get this off in an easy fashion - boiling water while scraping with a wooden spoon, soaking overnight.. basically everything that has always worked without a problem on even the most extreme messes on my other pots and pans.

Eventually I managed to free up the char by using a plastic putty knife and really, REALLY digging into it, as the char flaked up a bit at a time. However I'm hesitant to use this thing again, as this has become a bit of a pattern.

When I first purchased the pot, another recipe called for browning cubed pieces of pork country-style ribs, then simmering with some broth. Same char developed on the bottom of the pan, and same scraping was required.

Any ideas as to what I did wrong or what I can do in the future to prevent this problem? Heaven forbid I actually ever truly burn something in this pot, I can't imagine ever having enough strength or patience to scrape off that kind of char..

Thanks in advance!