When I was in high school I worked at a quaint sandwich/soup shop where one of my duties was to prep the fresh vegetables for the sandwich bar. I quickly learned waterproof mascara is my friend as I would “cry” and cry while peeling and
slicing the onions. Since then I’ve had a love/hate relationship with onions. I love the flavor they give dishes, but I really dislike chopping them, so I frequently utilize my freezer to cut down on the work. They way I figure it, as long as I’m peeling and chopping one onion, I might as well peel and chop six, and save myself the need to chop next time I need onions.
Simply peel, and chop as you normally would (I personally love using a food processor), and then portion into freezer bags. (Refer to Tricia’s handy sliced and diced post for help on portioning.) Next time you need chopped onions, grab a bag from the freezer, thaw, and add to your normal recipe.
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Join the discussionHow is the texture of the thawed onions? Would you use them in any recipe or would they be best in certain preparations?
Thanks for sharing.
The texture is just right for soups, casseroles, stirfry, fajitas, browning with ground beef, etc.
Trick i learned years ago in a kitchen & i share every chance i get: soak onions in room temp water. Seriously, ive worked line cook jobs 5yrs+ & ive never had an issue chopping onions, sometimes cases at a time! Cut both ends, peel, & simply place in a bowl of room tempt water. (Itll pull the white juice out but has no effect on flavor whatsoever) even if it only sits 2 minutes, you will notice the difference. Keep choppin!
love this, do this all the time. advice: set up an assembly line outside! then the fumes won’t get to you. I use my patio table. I chopped, diced, sliced 20 pounds of onions a week ago – before it’s winter & I can’t do it outside any more.
why so much? made french onion soup for the freezer, too! yay!
I ran into this issue just last month. The amount of onion I had to dice had everyone in my house begging to go outside! It was awful. I just noticed I have 4 onions that need to be used up soon before they go bad and I will dice up and freeze for future use but found this tip on pinterest..Stop the waterworks that normally accompany chopping onions with a candle. The flame burns off some of the fumes and carries away the rest.
Or wear your kids’ summer swim goggles. Makes for a funny kitchen, but it stops the tears!
I have done that!!! And added a towel over my face so I couldn’t smell the onions.. heee hee I was the onion cutting bandit!
I chop the onions next to my gas stove with the burner on. For me, this works better than a candle.
How do you get a good chop in the food processor? I tried it last time and ended up with onion water.
It might depend on the food processor…mine has a pulse setting that works pretty well. One of my other favorite tools for chopping onions is the Pampered Chef (there are probably other brands too) chopper.
Does the onion lose any flavor after being frozen and thawed? I find that after even only a day or two in the fridge they lose some flavor, but maybe not when freezing? Thanks!
My trick for chopping onions: Suck on a metal spoon. Before you ever cut the onion, put a spoon in your mouth, and don’t open your mouth until you’re done. (If you’re doing a ton of onions, when you need to remove the spoon to swallow or take a break you must leave the kitchen or you will start to cry on the next cut).I don’t know how it works, but it does. This is the only way I don’t cry when chopping onion, and I LOVE onion.
Weird! Sounds like it would make a good YouTube video. 😉
And these are the little ideas that I read your posts for. I don’t think of these simple things. My husband hates onions, and I love them. I’m always chopping like a quarter of an onion to cook separately. Then I gotta wrap the rest and store it, and I use onions in almost everything I cook myself. So I’m doing this process over and over again.
My friend recommended this site after she heard I’d spent a day cooking to freeze foods for about 3 weeks. I’m so glad she did – i have been browsing your site for over an hour now!!Question about freezing onions: any specific bags that you’d recommend using? I froze onions before (also hate cutting them up, and prefer to do them in the processor), and they made the freezer smell for quite some time, even though I sealed the bags properly. :/
I have had a little better luck with the freezer plastic or glass containers rather than the bags. If you use bags you might try double or triple bagging. Welcome to the site! And thank your friend for us for sending you. 🙂
I use freezer bags when possible (smaller portion size bags don’t usually come in a thicker Freezer bag) but don’t worry you will put your smaller portioned bags into a 1 Gallon Freezer bag and seal. No onion smell in the freezer until you open the bag again. 🙂 I prep and portion the onions in different size bags assuming different uses and cuts: small dice, medium dice, large dice, rings, thin slices and thick slices from top to root.
My mom, lovely woman that she is, bought me a Vidalia chopper a few years ago. When I’m chopping onions, I peel it, quarter it, and slam it through the chopper….far fewer tears. Not to mention, it’s quick, and you get all kinds of aggression out of your system slamming that top down. 😀
https://www.chopwizard.com/ (I’m including the link, in case anyone doesn’t know what I’m talking about)
That looks like a wonderful tool! Thanks for including the link!
I have run into that problem when using those fancy choppers, be careful to check the food for bits of plastic when using the finely dice blade for some reason sometimes some of the plastic from the part the pushes the food through the blades gets shaved as well.
This is the best way to chop most anything, esp if you have special needs that require things to be microminced so that you can digest them properly. My only complaint about this product is that even though it is dishwasher safe you will spend a time picking pieces of onion skin out of the top piece by hand.
It comes with a special cleaning tool just for that job. You can also chop tomatoes, peppers, apples, and anything that you need chopped. It only takes two minutes or less to chop 10 onions or tomatoes.
Awesome tip. I bought a 3 pound bag of onions last week for $1 so I have some onions that need frozen. You can chop them and ay them on a cookie sheet. Flash freeze them for a couple of hours and then bag them. They won’t stick together. Also, I learned another trick: if you don’t need to use all of the onion, leave the root end attached. Wrap it up and refrigerate it. Your refrigerator won’t smell like onions with the root on.
that’s great!!
Hello! I love this site. I am starting my cooking this weekend. I did this once before last year and it was amazing. I want to get back to a regular schedule doing it because I homeschool, take care of my elderly mother and have my own home business. I am very busy and I love cooking but never seem to have time. I have a question and it may be a dumb one but I need to know. If I plan to spend say $300 for these meals. Does this cover 3 meals a day for a month, 3 weeks? Do you find yourself going to the store for more shopping or just milk and bread? I am trying to do my budget and it is a tight one so I need to plan.
Vicki
Hi Vicki! This post helps to explain how we pick the meals for our menus https://onceamonthmeals.com/ive… and you can see how long they would last you in your house. I personally get milk once a week and some fresh vegetables but I go to the store much less when I do a good OAMM cooking day.
I have been freezing onions for many years. However, I freeze them before I chop or slice. For very large onions I will cut them in half before freezing. Frozen onions DO NOT CAUSE TEARS and are very easy to slice, dice, etc.
Awesome tip Jean! I didn’t even think to freeze them whole! Thanks!
I read all the comments and I’m going to try it. My friend gave me a big bag of onions and I don’t won t them to go bad. I was wondering if I could use the food saver.
I chill my onions in the freezer for 15 minutes before I chop them- no tears! If you are doing bulk- blanch them first- dry them- (strips are easier) then rack and dry.. then tray and freeze, then bag. 🙂 I just gave my neighbor that chop wizard because I didn’t have enough room for all my kitchen tools- time to steal it back for a while 🙂 at least to do all the onions! 🙂