Chewing gum or eating sugar cubes while peeling onions will keep you from crying.
There are various methods, with proponents of each, it does work really and here’s why:
- Chew gum or eat sugar cubes (this causes you to breathe through your mouth, inhibiting the amount of gas that gets into your nose)
- Put the onion under water, then chop it (water absorbs the onion’s gas)
- Put lime juice on the knife blade before chopping (the acid of the lime reacts with the gas of the onion)
- Chill the onion before cutting it (chilling changes the chemical compound in the onion which causes it to release less gas)
- Basically, if you find a way to stop the odor of the onion going into your nose, you’re not going to cry. Breathe through your mouth is the best advice.
- Another Method that really gets to the root of the problem…Using a knife, cut a cone out of the bottom of the onion (where the roots come out). The diameter of this cone should be about a third of the diameter of the onion, and about 1/3 deep. Take this piece and throw it away (don’t put it down the disposal!). This piece contains the part/gland that makes baby Jesus and everyone else in the room cry when you’re chopping it up. Once you’ve gotten that piece out, chop off the top, peel, and slice the onion.