Here's How To Cook Perfect Meals With 6 Different Onions
Unsure about which onions to use in your dinners? Here's your complete guide to the perfect use of onions.
Ryan Aliapoulios
03.27.18

If you’re used to cooking a lot, you know that onions play a pretty pivotal role in most recipes. In Italian cuisine, onions might go in a spaghetti sauce. In France, you might sauté some onions with garlic as a base for something else. No matter where you, onions are likely to play a role in the food there. Still, there are many different kinds of onions and they aren’t interchangeable.

In fact, many of us may reach for the cheapest or most convenient type of onion without considering what makes that onion unique—and hurting the flavor of their meals in the process. Fortunately, we’ve created a cheat sheet for cooking with six different kinds of onions.

With this information, you can use these six types of onions in your cooking perfectly, every time.

1. Yellow Onions

pixabay.com
Source:
pixabay.com

Of all the onions, the yellow onion is probably the one that you’ll reach for the most when you’re cooking. That’s because of all the onions listed here, they have the strongest flavor—probably due to their combination of high sulfur and high sugar! They also happen to be particularly high in fiber. When you add all of these traits together, you get an onion that is especially useful for caramelizing as they will hold up under high temperatures and the flavor will remain throughout the process. Basically, if a recipe doesn’t specify which onion to cook, yellow onions are a safe bet.

2. Red Onions

flickr.com/sawnnakaya
Source:
flickr.com/sawnnakaya

When it comes to eating onions raw or using them in conjunction with other foods (like salads or sandwiches), red onions are your way to go. These have less sulfur and less sugar, and thus have a less intense flavor. On the other hand, cooking with these won’t give you a ton of onion flavor in your food. As an added bonus, red onions have been said to prevent cancer growth and development.

3. White Onion

flickr.com/lynnfriedman
Source:
flickr.com/lynnfriedman

Though white onions have a milder flavor than yellow onions, they still pack a decent punch—and they have a lot of crunch to them. These are another good option as a cooking onion though they will lead to a less intense onion flavor than the yellows will. These onions are particularly anti-inflammatory and play a major role in Mexican cuisine.

4. Sweet Onions

flickr.com/chiotsrun
Source:
flickr.com/chiotsrun

You may see sweet onions in the store labeled as Vidalias, Walla Wallas or Maui’s. In general, these onions have papery skin as well as low sulfur and high water content. This combination of qualities makes them another onion that you can eat raw, mixed with a sauce or on top of a burger. As with the others, their mild flavor and sweetness don’t make them a great candidate for caramelizing or cooking.

5. Green Onions

flickr.com/Emilian Robert Vicol
Source:
flickr.com/Emilian Robert Vicol

Green onions are also known as scallions and are particularly popular in Chinese and Japanese cuisine. These have a very mild flavor and are usually served raw, often as a garnish on top of a rice dish. They are high in Vitamin K and C and are actually the stalks of regular bulb onions. Due to their delicate structure, they are not likely to hold up well over extreme heat—though they are incredible in scallion pancakes!

6. Shallots

flickr.com/missy
Source:
flickr.com/missy

Finally, shallots are the sweetest and mildest of all the onions on this list (and they are also the most expensive). These onions can are very mild and be put to great use in salads and in salad dressing. They taste somewhat similar to garlic and are high in antioxidants. Still, as these are a specialty onion, you may be able to substitute in another mild onion if you don’t want to spring for the expensive ones.

Please SHARE this with your friends and family.

Advertisement