Plant sprouting onions

Plant sprouting onions especially for their greens.

Don’t throw away your onions when they start to sprout; dig a small hole in the garden, add some compost and plant the bulb. Within a few weeks they will start producing long green-shoots that you can snip off and add to your salads and stews.

An ancient soup recipe, over 6000-years old says, "First take an onion and then make something that will warm the soul."

I can’t think of anyone who would disagree with that sentiment. It is the one vegetable that almost everybody enjoys and uses in their cooking; and for good reason. We just need more of it. The flavour added to a soup or stew is amazing; even more important are the wellness-benefits.

The onion family in general contains an amazing array of phytochemicals that scientists are busy testing with very interesting results. It is particular rich in three; allicin, quercetin and kaempferol^[1,2]. They not only make your eyes water but strong research in peer-review journals convincingly shows the protective effect of these flavonoids against disease.

Listed are astonishing proofs of how people who enjoy adequate quantities of onions have less malignant tumours, cardiovascular-diseases and protection against neurological sicknesses; and a host of others. This I suspect is even more true of their greens.

Onions are known in nutritional jargon as a functional food; they help prevent disease and simultaneously enhance wellness. That is why folk who eat eight or more coloured fruits and vegetables every day have a 35% lower all-cause of death; that’s massive.

The meat and potatoes diet should have gone out years ago along with B&W television; it’s time to upgrade to colour.

I don’t know about you but by the time we reach the bottom of a pocket of onions, there always seem to be a few that are going soft and are starting to sprout. If you plant them instead of sending them to the dump, you will be very pleasantly surprised within a few months what a thriving patch of greens you have.

Snip a few leaves for your salad and more for your stews; they add a rich flavour, improve your well-being and reduce your reliance on bought onions. It’s so easy.

For a different slant knowing how onions grow will give you a better understanding of this wonderful vegetable.

Allicin

Allicin is one of the phytonutrients found mainly in the onion family where much research has been done. Historically it goes back into the mists of time. Hippocrates used it for example more than two thousand years ago for wound healing and the treatment of pneumonia.

• Does allicin fight infections?
  

Plant sprouting onions

Nearly a third of all the food grown for human consumption is dumped in one way or another; it is a crime against community and the Earth. Don’t chuck those sprouting-onions; just plant them.

In short we need to make sure we are enjoying onions, leeks and shallots regularly; and don’t forget the garlic and chives. They taste of heaven in any case; it is so easy to add them daily to our fare, raw or cooked.

This pork slithers with chives dish is one of our favourites. You could just as easily use the greens if you have taken the trouble to plant sprouting onions; thirty-minutes from start to finish to cook this meal.

On a personal note

Finding my health threatened by two serious conditions, I turned to consuming these functional super foods in an attempt to stay well. Both have been kept in remission so that in the wrong half of my seventies I still take no chronic medication; nor does the good wife.

That's only an anecdote and of no scientific value but I am utterly convinced that enjoying many coloured fruits and vegetables on a daily basis is one of the prime reasons we continue to remain in fine fettle. We have plenty of energy and are kept busy all day long; except for a short power-nap after lunch.

• A healthy diet for prediabetes
• What I did when shocked by the diagnosis of Parkinson's Disease
  

It's such a relief not having to fuss with medication and worry about consultations with doctors. We go at life at full speed, grateful to the Almighty for the abundance of fresh food free from pesticides that we can grow.

Young broad beans supply the dopamine that keeps my Parkinson's Disease in remission

The greens that we harvest after planting sprouting onions are an important ingredient in Eggs Parkinson's Disease that we so love.

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