Edit: Swim goggles should work too if you don’t have to worry about glasses.
I know this will be obvious to some, but I’ve never seen anyone in my family wear them. It’s so obvious once you think about it, and yet I’d wager most people (especially ones who don’t cook as a hobby) have never tried this.
The reason you cry is because slicing onions produces an organosulfur called syn-Propanethial-S-oxide. Lab goggles – as designed – keep the chemical irritant from reaching your eyes. I’ve used them hundreds of times now, and I think there was one time it got into my eyes when I didn’t have the goggles situated right (not difficult; I was just being a moron).
My 3M anti-fog pair were about $5 USD when I got them, and it looks like they’re about $7.50 USD now. For that price, I never have to dread cutting up onions again. It’s not magic; it’s just basic PPE, and it works. You can even wear them over eyeglasses (I’m sure some huge, circular frames won’t fit, but most should).
Even if you forget them and remember them midway through slicing, it can still help somewhat. So even if you’re as absent-minded as I am, you can benefit from trying this.
These (below) were the ones I got personally, but feel free to try what you already have if you already have a pair on-hand for e.g. cleaning. I’d assume the important thing is just that they’re goggles, not glasses.
Why YSK: owie, oof, ouchie, my eyes. Cooking is just DIY organic chemistry.
Use a sharp knife because a duller knife is less safe, and it does more smashing than cutting which casues more fumes.
Don’t put your head over the onions as you work. Take a half step back and extend your arms more so you’re further away from the fumes.
If your kitchen is not well ventilated, put your cutting board on the stove and turn on the hood.
Don’t cut the root off either. Use it to hold the onion together and in my experience also seems to lessen the effect on my eyes.
This is true. (re: droplets; study also rejects the popular chilling method). People in my experience don’t understand how much safer a sharp knife is until you put one in their hands and get them to just try it.
Otherwise, though, the “fume hood” approach seems extremely excessive when a cheap, comfortable, unobstructive pair of goggles is likely to work more consistently and with less thought. I merrily chop with my cutting board wherever I want and standing however I want.
A sharp knife is something you should be using regardless, but these other methods like meticulous posture, fume hoods, pre-soaking, etc. all seem more convoluted and varying degrees of less effective than grabbing some goggles from a drawer and putting them on your face.
How soft do you have to be to cry over cutting an onion? Like, they can’t even feel it so just chill.
We vegans kind of slide everything over, so slaughtering animals becomes unthinkable, and butchering vegetables becomes sad.
“Onions make me sad, a lot of people don’t realize that. When I’m cutting onions, I’m sad. Because the plight of onions, it’s sad. But people don’t realize I’m actually crying - they think I’m just reacting.”
Mitch Hedberg
I don’t consider onion tears a problem. It’s an experience I would not want removed from my life, as it is one of those things letting me feel the nuance of being alive.
Red onions bring the most tears here, and yellow the least. I never notice yellow being an issuez but reds will make me take a step back sometimes to blot my eyes with something lol
I can’t relate to that dread part at all. If I knew it was harmful to my eyes I would reconsider this stance, but otherwise, yeah, I’m glad for the pain it causes.
I feel plenty alive wearing swimming goggles in my kitchen.
A Metal Gear villain in the making.
Cold buddha shivers, hot buddha sweats, onion-chopping buddha cries 🧘♀️
It’s a bit like overdoing wasabi, I don’t really do it deliberately and don’t particularly enjoy it in the moment, but it makes me feel very alive!
Keeping your knives wicked sharp also helps a lot.
You could also sharpen your knives and cut them properly.
I lift weights and have sex with girls. Works for me.
Congratulations on adding three pushups to your weightlifting regimen.
Tried this with a pair of swim goggles once. Worked with the onions, but got clowned so hard by my roommates I cried anyway 😭
Then all of a sudden your goggles are filled with tears.
No need for a sharp knife, just don’t breathe with you nose (or don’t breathe at all while cutting).
You can also just add water. Cut them wet.
Presoaking and making the cut slightly more dangerous seems like a silly solution when you have a pair of goggles in a drawer unless you’re waiting for your soon-to-be-only pair of goggles in the mail. Especially because all you’re likely to be doing is kind of watering down the droplets, making it less bad.
I think by adding H2O you eliminate most of the vapour…I think. It works.
It absolutely works if you just wash them beforehand (not soak), or when you’ve cut them in half/quarters.
That’s what I was saying
And I’m confirming 😉
Cut vertically (with the veins). You basically get no stinging that way (until you start cutting horizontally)
Or a small fan to blow/suck it away from you
yep. I just blow it into the living or dining room. easier for half a dozen people to deal with it than just myself
Literally never had that happen. And it’s often more than half a dozen people in the room the fan faces. Concentration of it is too diluted by the air from the fan or something. Not sure why it doesn’t have the effect but I’ve never had a problem in that regard.
Seems like it might make sense but is not my experience, anecdotal evidence being what it is
Same with swim goggles and snow goggles.
Everyone should own some eye protection. A quality respirator is also extremely useful and very wise to have around in many circumstances.
Let’s pull out the breathing mask one uses for spray paint and invite someone over for dinner /s and /j
Swim goggles are better at making a seal, and are more covenant to throw in a drawer or something.
Yeah, I mention those at the top, but doesn’t work for people who need/want to wear glasses. Plus, at least to me, putting on swim goggles dry pulls on my hair and is uncomfortable. Lab goggles are the more generalized – and arguably comfortable – solution, and realistically, there’s no issue with the lab goggles’ seal (the mistake I made one time was because I was being an idiot and wouldn’t have been prevented by swim goggles).
