There are countless recipes in which we need to use one or more onions. Just counting those that start with a sauce, the list would be endless, without forgetting those dishes in which it is the true protagonist. We love them in every way, although preparing them is another story. Fortunately, with this trick to peel them easily the tedious work becomes a much simpler task.
We are not talking about cutting and chopping them, whose technique will be different depending on the specific recipe and that only requires a good knife and some practice, but about the previous step: peel the onion. Here the paring knife and the manual peeler are useless, the best tool is still our hands and we seek to make the most of the vegetable, leaving it very clean.
The discomfort arises when the skin is too attached, especially the innermost layers, causing broken pieces to stick together, forcing us to stain our fingers or tear out part of the onion that we would not want to discard. If we are going to make stuffed onions or we want to cut them into rings or a nice julienne, the nicks are a nuisance.
The definitive trick that the culinary stylist Kate Ramos has shared on Instagram could not be more easy; so much so that we don’t know why we hadn’t applied it before.
Starting from a common onion, and always with a good sharp knife in hand, place it on one of its sides on a kitchen board. Next, we have to cut the ends in the form of discs, but without practicing the complete cut, leaving a part attached to the body of the onion.
So we can pull the cut end gently to take with it a band of skin, pulling to the opposite end. Once both stops are removed, we will have two vertical openings in the body of the onion. Now we only have to peel that outer layer taking advantage of those cuts, using our nails -clean, please-, or a peeler or lace-type knife, with a fine blade.
In this way, the outer and dry layer of skin will come off easily without damaging the inner meat, leaving us with a clean and beautiful onion to use. It is a trick that will work with any type of onion, although it will be easier with fresher and crunchier, round and larger specimens. Of course, the discards and the skin can be used to make a broth.
Ibili 782502E – Onion Holder-Display Box
Pictures | Marco Verch – Unsplash
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