How To Cut Onions Faster Without Any Tears Holding You Up
I love my onion cake, but every time I make it I’m terrified by the idea of cutting one whole kilogram of onions. Sure you can imagine how many tissues I need to get through that process. How much time I lose because I need to take quite a few breaks, simply because my eyes are burning like mad and I can’t see what I’m doing. Every time I think: It would be so nice not to cry my soul out, and I could be so much faster…
So, now I did some research how to chop onions without crying. People can’t seem to totally agree on what works and what doesn’t, so at the end of the day, you’ll have to try it out and see what works for you.
It’s helpful to understand why onions make us cry: When you cut the root, it releases an enzyme which reacts with the onion and the oxygen in the air. The gas that is then produced creates an acid when it meets the water in your eyes, causing them to tear to flush the acid out.
There are three basic strategies that can help you to cut onions without crying, and each one has several ways to achieve your goal:
- Cut the onions properly
- Keep the gas out of your eyes
- Hinder or stop the gas production
- Using a sharp knife: The fatal enzyme is released when cells are broken. So, the fewer cells you break, the fewer enzymes will be released, meaning your eyes will be exposed to less tear creating acid. A blunt knife does break and crush the cells badly, whilst a very sharp one rather slices them.
- Remove the root “of all evil”: The onions root contains the highest concentration of acid enzymes, so you should cut it only when you really have to. An excellent way of avoiding tears is to simply remove the root completely even before peeling the onion. To do this, cut the bottom part of the onion out in a circular way. Don’t keep it lying near you, throw it into the dirt bin immediately. Watch this nice video that shows you how to do that and chop onions without tears!
- Cut fast: The faster you cut, the sooner you get your onion into the pan where the troublesome enzymes are destroyed immediately. Less time for the gas to get into your eyes and make you cry. But be careful that you only cut the onion, not your fingers! Don’t cut faster than you can. You rather want to bear some tears than losing a finger.
Very reasonable: If you don’t get the gas into your eyes, it can’t create acid there. No acid in your eyes means no tears, and that’s what you want. There are plenty of ways to keep your eyes gas free:
- Protect your eyes: Wear a mask or gas-tight goggles. Contact lenses also seem to form a barrier between your eyes and the gas.
- Divert the gas: Have a strong draft close to your onion cutting place, e.g. your stoves extractor or a fan blowing the gas away from you.
- Breathe through your mouth: Your wet tongue then absorbs the gas. Also, the gas does not get to touch the tear duct nerves which are causing the tears.
- Have water absorbing the gas: If you can have water absorbing most gas before it reaches your eyes, this should at least alleviate the tearing. Have running water next to your onion cutting place. Cut your onion close to steam, e.g. from a kettle. Cut the onion under water. (I think that might work well for peeling them but sounds difficult for chopping onions.)
- Burn the gas: Alternately, you can try to burn most of the gas by cutting onions close to your gas stove or a lit candle. The flame will attract and burn the gas.
- Keep the cuts pointing away from you: The "anatomy" of onions resembles many little tubes pointing from one end of the onion to the other. If you point them away from you, the gas will not spray into your eyes so easily. Also peel the onion only right before cutting it, and place the half you don’t currently use with the cutting edge down on your cutting board.
- Chew something: No matter what you chew, chewing stimulates breathing through your mouth and is thus keeping the gas out of your eyes. Try chewing gum whilst cutting onions!
- Chill the onions: The secret behind it is that coldness reduces the amount of enzymes that are released when cutting. You can chill the onions in the freezer but make sure you don’t freeze them as they will be very mashed when thawing. Chilling onions is quite a controversial method. Some say it’s best, some say it doesn’t work at all. Maybe it works for some and for others it doesn’t. After reading lots of articles, it seems to me that it does help to reduce the tearing but your eyes will still suffer some irritation.
- Impede the gas production: The acid enzymes are denatured by acid, water and ionic solution. Try the following: (A) Put vinegar on your chopping board. (B) Soak your onions in water or salt water.
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