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This is the best tear-free onion-chopping trick. With this simple and elegant solution, you’ll learn how to slice, dice, and cut onions without crying.
OK, this little trick for how to cut onions without crying is truly a good one. I’ve heard all kinds of old wives’ tales about how to stop yourself from crying when you’re cutting onions as we all have, and none of them seem to really work.It’s amazing how dramatic dinner preparation can get sometimes when you take a sweet little onion that brings so much joy and flavor to your dishes and try to actually put it into whatever you’re cooking. It’s definitely worth the tears when you taste the final results of all your culinary efforts, but why go through all that if you don’t have to? The one trick that I’ve found to actually work is, like so many other good things, about the most simple solution that you could possibly think of. The next time you go to mince onion for your favorite recipe, whether it’s a white onion, red onion, or Vidalia, you’ll definitely thank me.
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How to Cut Onions Without Crying
Light a candle. That’s it.
Well, OK, not just any candle anywhere in your home. You’ll want to light a candle right next to where you’re working, within about six to eight inches of the onion you’re chopping.
Any candle will work to some extent, and it doesn’t make a difference whether the candle is unscented or not, although I mostly prefer to use unscented candles for this purpose. There’s something about the aroma of lavender or eucalyptus blending with the smell of flavorful, savory dishes that just doesn’t sit well with me.
A candle where the flame comes into direct contact with the air around the onion as much as possible works best, so something like an elegant taper candle or a pillar candle on a dish works better than a candle protected by a hurricane candle holder or a glass jar.
More kitchen tips for healthy eating: How to Make Baked Sweet Potatoes in the Crock Pot
Why Do Onions Make You Cry?
Onions contain compounds that come together to form a mild, very annoying irritant called syn-propanethial S-oxide. When an onion is diced, chopped, or sliced with a knife, liquids are released from the cells of the onion and combine with sulfuric acid to create this irritating compound, which turns to vapor and is released into the air. This compound causes a burning sensation when it reaches your eyes, and as a protective measure, your body immediately releases tears in an attempt to flush the irritants away.
Why Does This Way Work When Others Have Failed?
Most home cooks aren’t too concerned with why standing over a cutting-board slicing onions makes them cry; they just want to know what works to fix it.
The reason this method is so much more effective than all the others we’ve tried in the past is quite logical, really. If you’ve ever been in a room with wood-burning fireplace, you know that the air in the room gets really dry, really quickly because the fire just sucks all the moisture out of the air.
In the case of chopping onions, some of the moisture in the air is the tear-causing onion juice that is released when you slice, so the candle sucks the surrounding air into it, and burns up the onion juice at the same time.
More essential kitchen knowledge: How to Properly Dice an Onion
Whether you understand what’s going on or not, it really works, and it’s amazing for onion tear sufferers like myself. And it makes me happy. Or at least it makes me look happier when I’m cutting onions! Ha!
Try it out the next time you find you’re starting to brace yourself as you’re peeling back the papery skins from yellow onions. You may never have to shed an allium-related tear again!
Do you have a favorite trick for how to onions without crying?
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Courtenay Hartford is the author of creeklinehouse.com, a blog based on her adventures renovating a 120-year-old farmhouse in rural Ontario, Canada. On her blog, Courtenay shares interior design tips based on her own farmhouse and her work as founder and stylist of the interior photography firm Art & Spaces. She also writes about her farmhouse garden, plant-based recipes, family travel, and homekeeping best practices. Courtenay is the author of the book The Cleaning Ninja and has been featured in numerous magazines including Country Sampler Farmhouse Style, Better Homes and Gardens, Parents Magazine, Real Simple, and Our Homes.