Reduce food waste
Onion gallery
Here are some photographs I have taken through the onions growing season. These pictures show you what your crop should look like each step of the way through growing to being ready to harvest, harvesting, drying and storing.
Onion recipes
This section provides a list of tasty onion recipes and links to recipes using onions on other websites. It is aimed at helping you to find some new and exciting ways to eat your onions, because when you have a glut of any fruit or vegetable it is easy to get bored with eating them presented the same way every day.
Onions in our house are used in nearly every savoury dish we make. Onions are an extremely versatile vegetable and they can be cooked in almost any way with any meat, fish, poultry or other vegetables or served as a side dish on their own. The unique flavour adds depth to most dishes similar to the addition of herbs and seasonings. In our house almost all our main dishes incorporate onions somewhere.
As onions are such a staple food for us I have made it a personal challenge to find some tasty onion recipes that focus on them as a main ingredient. I have shared with you recipes from the many cook books we own, many of which are out of print, and recipes we have gathered from friends that we have enjoyed along the way. I hope you like them too.
Pictures to follow!
Happy eating!
Recipes eaten and enjoyed by us, our family and friends.
This is a must do recipe if you fancy slow cooked onions for a barbeque. There is something extra special about slow cooked onions the way they cook them on a burger van so make your own and don't miss out just because you are at home.
My only experience of French Onion soup prior to discovering this recipe was for a speedy version. Mythoughts on this are if you don’t have time to make it properly, it takes 1.5 hours, make something else.
I love savoury flans, tarts and quiches hot or cold. This is one I have adapted from the original and use as a base for every style of filling I fancy.
These beans are a must have accompaniment for any BBQ we have, especially if we have friends coming over. They also make a great meal in themselves - remember to YeeeHaaaaw!
A lovely way to dish up onions as a vegetable. Great on a buffet table if you have fussy visitors and want to accomodate those that love raw onions and tomatoes.
A great snack or light meal that offers a lttile more flavour than the traditional Welsh Rarebit.
This is a must have with sausage and mash in our house. Give it a try, it works well with Yorkshire puddings too so try making a Toad In The Hole for an even more filling meal but our favourite is with a chop and veg.
This is a great side dish for that time when you are getting through a glut of courgettes. Make sure you get an even covering of oil and let the vegetables caramelise. Great served hot or cold.
If you like these recipes, we have a whole section dedicated to sharing recipes with you. Our recipe of the week is linked to our Facebook page so Like Us to keep updated of anything new. If you have an onion based reciepe to share, send it in, we would love to hear from you.
Links to other Onion Recipes
Eat and enjoy!
Onions
Onions are round and bulbous with a papery skin made up of fleshy juicy layers and one of those vegetables that need little introduction. They have been used through the centuries for many things, including using the dried skins as a yellow vegetable dye. Very few people don’t know what they are as they are used in so many savoury dishes, no matter what your cultural background. There are many varieties of onion and they can be used in almost any way imaginable so are always in demand in the kitchen and therefore are a good vegetable to grow. With careful planning there should be ample supply of onions year round to suit your culinary needs.
Whilst the majority of our onions will be cooked to eat there are less strong varieties which are great eaten raw in salads or pickled ready for Christmas. Main crop onions have been left to mature and are best for storage over winter. Other types, the ones we use raw, will have been lifted earlier in the life cycle and benefit from eating within a few days. The ones we are most familiar with include;
- Salad or spring onions – these are younger less developed bulbs with white stems at the end of green leaves. Great eaten raw or in stir fries
- Pickling onions – immature bulbs about the size of a conker, will have a slightly stronger flavour than spring onions and be more fiddly to peel than their mature siblings.
- Red Onions – grown as main crop but as the name suggests the skins are red. These tend to be milder flavoured so make great additions to a salad.
- Main crop or yellow onions – These are the bulbous ones we use the most ranging in size from a small orange up to as big as a grapefruit these are the ones that’ll make your eyes water when you peel them and give you onion breath if you eat them raw. Having said that they are a must for me in a cheese and onion sandwich!
Timings for the best crop
There are two starting points for onions either grown from seed or grown from onion sets, small onions that have been grown from seed for you.
If growing from seed there are 4 main groups to choose from as follows;
- Japanese varieties – the seeds are sewn in August in their permanent bed and lifted in the following June
- August sewn varieties - the seeds are sewn in a nursery bed in august and transplanted to their permanent bed in the spring then lifted in August
- January sewn varieties - the seeds are sewn January under glass, transplanted in the spring to their permanent beds and lifted in September
- Spring sewn varieties - the seeds are sewn the spring in their permanent beds for harvesting in September If growing from onion sets you will be able to buy them from February. Plant them in April in their permanent beds and they will be ready for lifting in September. Buying onion sets in spring saves you the bother of planting seeds. If you want a steady supply of spring onions throughout the spring, summer and autumn, succession plant throughout the season every 3 to 4 weeks. If you are short of space salad onions grow well in pots
A quick note about Shallots
Shallots are very similar to onions. The main difference being that once planted each shallot splits to form a cluster of new bulbs. They are similar in size to a pickling onion, for which they are often used, and have a less stringent flavour than their onion cousins. Whilst smaller than onions they are good for cooking and ready to harvest earlier so if space is tight give them a go. Grown from a parent bulb plant your shallots in February to March and they should be ready in July
Time to love onions!
Growing onions
When planning to grow onions there are a few things you need to consider;
- Whether you want to grow from seeds or sets.
- How you plan to use the onions you grow.
- How much space you have available.
The answers to these questions will send you in circles if you are not careful. Space is your ultimate driver, if you have plenty then you can grow enough onions to feed your family all year round. If limited consider what you plan to use your onions for. If you eat a lot of salads through the summer you might want to grow spring or salad onions and therefore seeds are a better starting point. If you want the joy of growing for cooking and don’t want to fuss with seeds then sets are your best option.
How many Onions do you need?
As with any plant the better you look after it the better results you will see. In the case of onions if you plant 1 onion set your will harvest 1 onion. If you look after that onion, feed the soil it is to grow in and water as needed it will grow large, if you leave it to suffer with little food and water it will grow small. Therefore consider how much space you have allocated to your crop and buy accordingly. Sets should be planted approx 10 cm apart in rows 20 – 30 cm apart, seedlings and thinning out of seedlings to about the same distance. This allows enough space for good sized onions to develop. Spring onions and onions for pickling can be sewn closer together.
Soil preparation
Onions benefit from good soil, prefer a sunny spot and like a firmer ground to grow in. It is best to dig in the compost or manure and allow the ground to settle well before planting time.
Sewing the seeds
Sewing time, for seeds, depends upon the variety you choose to grow . Seedlings grown for transplanting will need to be hardened off if not grown under glass or will suffer frost damage. Seedlings grown over winter in situ should be fine unless we have a particularly hard winter.
Seeds should be sewn either thinly in pots or in a drill approx 1cm deep, lightly covered with soil and watered in. Rows should be approx 20 – 30cms apart.
- If transplanting - plant the seedlings in a hole approx 2cm deep, 10 cm apart in rows 20 - 30cm apart.
- If thinning – thin the seedlings when approx 5 cm high until you have onions 10 cm apart in their rows. These thinnings can be eaten as salad onions or passed on to other growers.
- Sets should be planted approx 10 cm apart in rows 20 – 30 cm apart with their tips just above soil level. After 2 weeks check and replant any that have surfaced, the birds may have been pulling them out or their new roots may have pushed them up, either way they’ll need a push back down.
Plant care
As the plants mature you will start to see the onion bulb swell. It is not unusual for up to half the onion to be above ground level. Plenty of water will help you to produce a better crop of larger onions. If the weather is dry, especially as the bulb is forming, water them regularly. If they don’t get enough water your plants may start to bolt, produce flowers and go to seed. If this happens the onion will produce a thick flower stem, all the goodness in the onion bulb will be used to produce the flower head and you will have no onion. There is nothing you can do to reverse this process so if they start to go either pull the onion and use it early in salads etc or leave it and enjoy the flower, remember to collect the seed for next year.
Growing onions in containers
Container growing is ideal for salad or spring onions as they need less space than main crop onions and can be succession grown . If you keep 2 or 3 containers of onions on the go as you use up 1 batch replace the compost and sew some more. Keep the containers near the kitchen and your salad onions will always be handy when you need them. Make sure you keep them well watered.
Happy growing!
Harvesting onions
In this section there are two approaches to harvesting because harvesting spring onions is entirely different to harvesting the mature round versions.
Harvesting spring onions is really a matter of lifting as you need them, before the white root end starts to swell. The roots may have tangled with neighbouring onions and if
you are not careful you may pull the tops off. So it is best to use a hand fork to loosen the soil around the onions you need before you gently pull the tops and release them from the soil. Trim the roots and strip off any dry dirty outer leaves for compost. Use within 1 week for salads and stir fries.
Harvesting mature onions
The mature onion harvest happens over a period of 4 – 5 weeks when the leaves start to turn yellow between July and September, depending upon the variety you are growing. At this point it is time to fold the leaves over, this encourages the bulb to store any goodness in the leaves as they die back. After approx 2 weeks loosen the roots so they die back then the skin around the bulb will start to dry out and toughen. In a further 2 weeks your onions will be ready to lift and store.
How to harvest
It is best to harvesting in the dry weather as your onions will be dry and the soil loose enough to shake off the roots. If you are unlucky enough to have to lift them in the wet weather remove as much soil as you can then lay them out somewhere dry and airy for a few days. Once lifted your onions will need to be left in a dry place to ripen before you store them, a shed or green house will be fine. Pick over the crop and remove any slightly damaged or split bulbs for immediate use. The bulbs will be ripe after another 2 weeks or so, longer for larger onions
Storing your harvest
What you do next will depend upon how you plan to keep the onions over winter. If strong enough, it is possible to plait the leaves on a string and form a string of onions that you can hang either in the kitchen ready to use or somewhere cool and airy for storage until needed.
Fresh – If your skills don’t run to plaiting or the leaves are too fragile and break off, remove the remains of the leaves to just above the swollen bulb, rubbing off any loose skins around the bulb and carefully place them in loose weave net onion bags, string or nylon bags are fine. The loose weave allows the air to circulate around the onions keeping them fresh and the outer skins dry. Any onions kept in the kitchen for immediate use should be stored in a cool dark place either loose in a vegetable rack or in an onion bag, never in a plastic bag. They will store in the refrigerator but the onion taste may transfer to other foods and they may make the refrigerator smell.
Frozen – onions freeze well but need to be sliced and blanched first in boiling water for 3 mins. Allow to cool completely before they are placed in ridged containers or freezer bags, label, date and place in the freezer.
Dried – yes perfectly possible cut up in slices and left in a warm oven for several hours or overnight until crisp. Store in an airtight container. Onions are ideal for pickles, chutneys and onion marmalade see individual recipes.
Happy harvesting!