Topic: Why do you grow onions

[littlebabybird]

I'm planning of using milk cartons(see JRP's thread) around the edge of the plot filled with Onions, other shallow rooting veg and flowers.
At least it will save room in the beds.

Neil

can't find the post. Why milk cartons?
thanks

http://www.allotments4all.co.uk/smf/index.php/topic,7549.0.html

[Tee Gee]

With me it is mainly for economic reasons!

How else could I get around half hundred weight of onions for a couple of pounds?

Then there are all the other reasons, taste, convenience, they don't go up in price when out of season, and I can keep my kids & grandkids well supplied for around ten months of the year.

Shallots although not as heavy, supplement the onions, and are nice cooked whole in a roast or stew.

And of course they are easy to grow!!

Plus I save next years supply of shallots meaning;  once I have bought one lot thats it for as long as I keep producing disease free stock.

[gardentg44]

With me it is mainly for economic reasons!

How else could I get around half hundred weight of onions for a couple of pounds?

Then there are all the other reasons, taste, convenience, they don't go up in price when out of season, and I can keep my kids & grandkids well supplied for around ten

months of the year.

Shallots although not as heavy, supplement the onions, and are nice cooked whole in a roast or stew.

And of course they are easy to grow!!

[Plus I save next years supply of shallots meaning;  once I have bought one lot thats it for as long as I keep producing disease free stock.]

you have taught me someting there Tee gee been buying new sets every year

[1066]

I'm planning of using milk cartons(see JRP's thread) around the edge of the plot filled with Onions, other shallow rooting veg and flowers.
At least it will save room in the beds.

Neil

can't find the post. Why milk cartons?
thanks

http://www.allotments4all.co.uk/smf/index.php/topic,7549.0.html

ahh - thanks for the link lbb. Don't really drink milk tho  ;D   

[Eristic]

I don't think the argument that they take up a lot of room is valid nor are they that cheap in the shops if you aggregate a years spend. Just one pole of space should easily produce over 400 man sized onions and if grown from seed will cost about £2 and tie up the land for only 4 months.

With shop onions you have no idea where they have come from, what they have been sprayed with or who has mauled them with their dirty hands. (OK you peel them but I'm getting fussy.) Plus, as a grower you need to consider what the price will be in 12 months time. I've seen onions hit £1per lb in the past but for me price is not the issue.

My stores are down to about 120 onions but there is two boxes of spring onions growing in the polytunnel and I have a small row of Welsh onions outside. I should just manage.

As for taste etc, there is far greater choice when home grown although when sliced diced and fried maybe there is not so much difference.

[telboy]

I agree with Kev. 1066.
I grow 'Stuttgarter' also & they are strong flavoured & great keepers!
I reckon supermarket onions are probably Spanish & mild?

[asbean]

The first year I grew some from seed and about 100 from sets and was delighted with the result.

So we worked out how many we would need for the following year:  about 300 split between overwintering and spring planted ones.  They didn't last much past Christmas, let alone a year's supply. Problem was, they were so delicious we had at least double the quantity.  Now we just grow about 250-300 a year and buy from the farmers' market when we've run out.  We never ever buy veg from the supermarket.

Our onions are always much stronger than the bought ones.

[Mrs Ava]

Cor, I couldn't imagine my allotment without onions.  I have rampant white rot on both my plots so it is a struggle to get a good harvest, therefore I cannot grow maincrop but do have reasonable success with overwintering hunions.  The great thing with those is they go in during the autumn as the allotment starts to empty, and they come out in very early summer as it starts to fill up.

I know they are poison free, they keep me in onions until about Christmas when the leeks kick in, they are sweet, juicy and packed with flavour, they win me prizes at our local horticultural show  ;D,  and they are cheap, a big bag of sets for a pound or 2 to grow over a hundred of them.  I also grow garlic and shallots for the same reason, and salad onions around my carrots to try and ward off carrot fly.  Leeks fill my hunger gap during late winter.

[hellohelenhere]

Lots of food for thought here! I wasn't planning to grow onions, as I don't have a tremendous amount of space, and the grocers round the corner sells a 4-kilo (nearly 9lb) bag for a quid! But the chemical residues issue is a good point.
I may well try shallots, I do love them in stews and I *don't* have a cheap source for those.

I've been mainly planning cooking greens, as we eat a lot of spinach, which my husband adores; and beans, and squash. Those things are all expensive to buy, and in the case of beans especially, so much better fresh.
Oh dear, with all this bad weather, I'm very behind in preparing my beds! Let's hope this winter nonsense is over soon. :(  I'm trying to picture my summer garden and it's getting more and more panicky as I remember how much I have still to do.

[powerspade]

I grow a lot of onions this year I shall be planting about 300 sets
The reason why is simply a home grown onions has a stronger flavour and tastes like a onion should. The onions from the supermarket taste like watered down cardboard and are not kept in the best condition. I ran out of my onions 3 weeks ago and so I had to buy shop onions from Asdas
the firdst onion I cut throught was rotten the second was rotten so I took them back and got a refund. If any of my own onions fail during storage I compost them

[1066]

Thanks for all the replies
So they are easy to grow, tasty (strong or sweet depending on what you grow), not sprayed (unless you do that), repel aphids etc, can save them to sow for next year, cos you can, cos they're good on the barbi, cos its just part of growing and eating your own, they are cheaper, and don't take up too much room. On the minus side they take up room and the return for money is not such a big saver compared to things like asparagus or artichokes. The 1 thing that has been mentioned is storage - I don't have a massive area for this so that could be a prob.
So it definitely seems a thumbs up then - only a few dissenters  8)
I'll pop back to the shop then  ;D they had some nice looking round shallots, can't remember the name for now, and plant them either between other plants or by the borders. wish me luck
1066

[Kea]

I would definitely grow shallots even if you don't grow onions because they are so easy to grow and taste so much better than the shop bought ones and they are expensive to buy. Also you can choose a variety to suit your needs i.e. some peel easier than others. I also grew red onions and found the flavour is so much better than shop bought ones. This is my first year growing the white onions i haven't bothered before mainly using shallots instead.

[Tee Gee]

Hi 1066

Let me clarify something you mentioned in your last post;

can save them to sow for next year,

This is shallots not onions!

and to clarify that before some one picks me up on it.

Yes you can do it with onions in so far as you sow seed one year to produce sets for the next.

been mentioned is storage - I don't have a massive area for this

This need not take up a lot of space as can be seen here;

[1066]

Thanks Kea I like red onions in salads or for roasting - so I'll see whats in the shop
And thanks for your post TeeGee. I had a similar idea in mind for storage - but the area I have in mind is quite small and any shallots or onions will be competing for space with all the other amazing crops I plan to grow this year - well amazing in my imagination and on the drawing board  ::)

[pippy]

When I first got my plot I didn't think I'd bother much with onions either, but as I had the space and everyone on the sites does them I decided to give them a go last year. 

Well - I am converted!  The great thing about them is that you can string them up and you have something from your plot to last into Autumn and winter, and which you use regularly every week.  Same applies to maincrop potatoes (not the stringing up tho!) - you know it's something you use a lot of so why not have some you know are totally organic, local and pest free? 

It's great to have something from the plot all year round and they do that pretty well.

[vegmandan]

Where I live out in the sticks,onions are a ridiculous price...about 50p a pound.

We must get through about 200lbs a year so that saves me best part of £100. ;D

[chriscross1966]

All the usual reasons plus a couple.... You get a better onion than most shop bought.... you get to choose the variety, I'm a bit wierd and I like the taste of Kelsae and there's no way you'll find them in the shops..... I also like proper pickled onions, before I lost the last patch I was growing on my pickles were winning awards in my local pubs Christmas pickle competition (even if someone did put a "Handling Precautions Advised, Treat as Toxic" sign on my picallilli one year....)..... where can I buy a thousand or so pickling onions from? .... I need silverskins for the picallilli and something like Zittau or Borettana for pickled onions....

chrisc

[Susiebelle]

Wish mine looked like that Tee Gee

[Trevor_D]

I wouldn't be without onions. In August & September I make enough chutney to last the whole year, and put them into tomato sauce to freeze for the year. Then the rest are strung and hang in our porch and see us through till after Easter at least.

Last year, we had to buy onions in late spring because ours had started to sprout. The bought ones had nothing about them.

And this year I've had to buy floury potatoes as ours have run out. (Still got a few Charlottes & Belle de Fontenay.) How do they store them? The taste is non-existent, the texture is wrong and some of them are bruised and have black bits in!

(I think this is another vote for growing as much as possible yourself!)

[actiongran]

ive found it interesting reading all the replies about onions and im grinning away to myself because i planted 366 for the leap year as the year beforei didnt have enough for one a day (around which all my meals are based!) plus 70 extra for failures! no such thing... its such a pleasure to grow something that just gets on with growing. I planted sets ( lots of red baron/stuttgart & shallots and some white somethings) and put all the rows close to other crops to help deter bugs etc. Some were overwintered(japanese) and some spring planted : they all seemed to be ready at the same time but i left a lot pulled but laid on the ground to store much later than the other lotty folk. im still eating them from my shed and havent had a cold yet all winter, i swear itts a good deterrent! good luck .