Hold back those tears and start eating “sunions”

Ah, got it, thanks.

If only most people knew of this quick n easy way, there’d be no need to develop tear-free onions.

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Man, 54 comments in, and nobody has posted the video of my favorite “chili-hand-to-eye contamination” comedy sketch?

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That’s basically what I do, except I leave the bottom of the onion on until I’m done cutting, so it doesn’t all fall apart. the last cut removes the bottom and I throw it away

For me it’s not about tearing up, although that may be a positive side-effect. I certainly notice onions bother me a lot less now than when I was a kid. I just do it that way because it’s the easiest/fastest way to dice an onion

the fact that I have a decent knife now, instead of some laser-cut serrated silliness probably helps the eye irritation also

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A good knife is essential. I love my santoku knife, which I use for everything vegetable.

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Yeah, I got a chicago cutlery santoku knife about a decade ago and it’s been really good. The pull-through sharpener that my partner was kind enough to buy was equally important, because if I didn’t have that, I think it would basically be a butter knife by now

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I love onions with all kinds of dishes. When we go to visit my dad in Florida he always has a bag of them at home that he uses in cooking, or that he just eats raw like an apple and I’m like “Right on, Onion King!” He says they’re special sweet onions but when I have them raw on a salad or sandwich they may as well just be iceberg lettuce, they are so bland and flavorless.

They grow in soil with very low sulfur levels, and apparently sulfur is what makes onions taste so good to me. So I’ll probably have zero interest in this sunion abomination, but if you like iceberg lettuce onions then more power to you! :grin:

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No actually. There are multiple approaches. The first thing is to have a very sharp knife. Your step number five is a fairly dangerous way to dice the onion whether or not it reduces tears.

Frenching (cutting perpendicular to the “equator”) of the onion destroys fewer cells than cross cutting. Releasing fewer noxious sulfer compounds.

The more cuts you make the more you release so fewer cuts minimize it.

For dicing an onion you make perpendicular cuts through the onion (and sometimes tip to root) carefully angle the knife tip up, heel down. To leave the onion connected to the root end. And avoid cutting the solid mass at the base of the root. There’s a lot more of the compounds in question down by the root end so you want to avoid slicing into that bit. then you cross cut.

Slicing cuts break fewer cells than push cutting. So you want plenty of lateral motion in your knife.

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And brathing through your mouth, I find.

Chewing gum helps too. I have no clue why.

Yes, but can I tie one to my belt?

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Exactly. Use a very sharp knife as not to crush the cells. Don’t cut your fingers in the process.

As onions are the Devil’s apples it’s going to take more than chemistry to help those evil things! An exorcism perhaps… :skull: I for one look forward to less toxic varieties that exact a more shall we say, heavenly experience.

Signed a hopeful onion sufferer. :cry:

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Maybe thats how they make the sunions.

I might need to try them now. I need my food to be more satanic.

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That’s pretty dangerous too. The horizontal cuts for dicing are both unnecessary and likely to allow your knife to slip and cut you. I remember seeing the Culinary Institute of America recommend doing this but most sources don’t. I stopped doing this quite a few years ago, my dice is as fine but I never cut myself.

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I’ve never cut myself doing that and it’s considered the “proper” way to a fine dice. If you have your off hand positioned correctly it’ll be tucked back where it’s unlikely you’ll cut your self.

It’s not neccisary and I don’t do it often. But the point of it is to slice the 2 sections of onion in either side. As those two sections tend to end up wider than the others, as they don’t contain the onion layers that stand in for horizontal cuts for the rest of the onion. Leading to some unevenness (you’ve now got some larger bits mixed into your dice).

It’s only something you should do if you’re concerned about evenness and consistency of your onion bits. And I’m not. I generally want my onions a bit uneven.

You can avoid it by making your vertical cuts radially, like when you French the onion. But since you’re moving the blade around there it’s probably less safe than the horizontal cuts. (when frenching you keep the knife straight up and down and rotate the onion)

More annoyingly the horizontal cuts tend to make the onion looser or even fall apart. Which is where the real danger of being cut comes in. As you’re attempting to hold it together. And it often brings it’s own level of inconsistency. Basically you need a very, very sharp knife and you should only bother if you need a very even, very fine dice.

I tried the “Kenji” method several times (doing deep horizontal cuts, leaving the stem intact, then deep vertical cuts, then dicing) and as @Ryuthrowsstuff says, it makes the onion so loose that you have to hold the whole thing together in order to dice it, which for me made it way more slippery and dodgy as bits came loose, etc.

Frankly, 95% of the time when I’m chopping an onion I’m going to either throw it into a recipe or sauté/caramelize it anyway, so I’m not at all concerned with the aesthetics of my dice. I just slice it into fairly consistently thick chunks, then chop the pile repeatedly until the bits are the approximate size I need — pausing to wipe the tears away.

My method is to cut onion in halves, then cut each half into even strips and then cross cut them, i don’t really bother making more cuts to get perfect cubes either. i don’t see what the point of going that far is.

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90% of the time I French the onion. The rest of the time it’s a rough dice. I only do a fine dice for the rare thing that really calls for it. Smooth stuffings/fillings/pates. Soups where you want minimal onion bits.

No, just the capsecum oils on your hands from those peppers and any part of your anatomy that does not need any extra stimulation.

Sort of like the warning you get when you eat the Jolokia hot wings: "Whatever you do, DO NOT WIPE YOUR EYES with that napkin."
You will go painfully blind for a while.

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