ONIONS -- Who Would've Thought?

I had no idea that you couldn't do this. Red onions are big so we normally use only half at a time. Sometimes they are in the fridge for up to 1 week until we use the other half. I've been doing it for years and haven't had any complications as of yet.

 

Hmmm. I'd like to back this up with other research. We've been using raw onions for years, and often I only use half an onion one day, and the rest in the next few days. None of us ever get sick. Sure, maybe we've been llucky. Maybe the onion information above is true. I don't know. But I have to admit I'm a tad skeptical.

I think I'll still be cautious with mayo until I see other evidence that it "doesn't even need to be refrigerated".

Dunno about the onion thing... :dunno: I guess I'm off to do some research!

 

I don't throw anything out---ever!!

The section of unused onion goes into a ziplock and we have never gotten sick--in fact, we are the couple that never catch anything...our immune systems must be super-charged!!:dunno:

But, we do take garlic and fish oil tablets daily..but only in the last couple years..

I will say that my husband felt he was getting a cold; I cut the onion in half and the next day he didn't have a cold..but the onion wasn't colored either.

Who knows....maybe it worked!!:dunno:

 

Hozay - I heard about that ages ago and have tried it. Just leaving the onion in a bowl didn't seem to do anything for me, so, I just eat-em-up. Raw, cooked, boiled, fried, steamed .... I love my onions!

Also - garlic is amazing for colds/flu - fresh is best (as always) ... :wave:

 

Another person who uses leftover onion. I've used it even weeks later and it's been fine. I've never had an issue. It is interesting tho about putting the onion in the room. My youngest seems to be having a rough winter and has been sick many times in the past few months. I may give this a try. I wonder how long the onion will last and how often it needs to be replaced? :confused:

 

Another email fairy tale.
Been going around for years and it is 100% BS.
But I do like onions.
If onions were a magical cure the pharmaceutical company's would be selling them with a Rx for $20 each.
I take Snops.com with a large dose of skepticism but they list it as false.

snopes.com: Onions Versus Swine Flu

 

"The moral of the story is, buy some onions and place them in bowls around your home. We did it last year, and we never got the flu."

I had 2 back surgeries last year and never got the flu, so everyones needs to get cut open to avoid the flu.

2 yrs ago I was hurt in a car crash and didn't get the flu, so everyone needs to get hit by a 75 yo man driving a truck.

3 yrs ago I stood on my head and never got the... ok forget it. You get the point.

 

Source:
Complete Onion information from Drugs.com

Onions placed around do nothing actually or at least hasnt been proven scientifically. Its an old wives tale. The poisonous onion leftovers is a myth. Everyone Ive known has used leftover onions and it actually seems to mellow the bite of most onions. As long as youre not cross contaminating onions with things like meat/blood or other contaminants, leftover onions are completely safe. Even if leftovers were contaminated, cooking to a proper temp. would destroy any pathogens.

This link talks about the issue:

Are Leftover Onions Poisonous? - Urban Legends

 

I don't automatically discount Old Wives Tales. Somewhere along the the line I believe most have some basis in truth but "modern" science doesn't yet know why they work.

 

Here's one of many sites that support using charcoal to alleviate food poisoning:
How to Use Activated Charcoal to Treat Food Poisoning | eHow.com

However, most of what I found on a google search said to use activated charcoal. One site said barbeque charcoal isn't as porous as activated charcoal and won't absorb the poisons fast enough, but then if you're not dealing with a deadly poison, treating a poisoning that just makes you sick but isn't life-threatening might do okay with barbeque charcoal:
Home health: the benefits and risks of charcoal supplements

One other site I looked at said you can use regular charcoal IF it has not been treated with lighter fluid or other chemicals.

On the other side, I did a search on whether it was dangerous to ingest charcoal and came up with a site that said people on dialysis shouldn't use charcoal (Complete Charcoal information from Drugs.com) and a site that said it "should not be used to treat the ingestion of corrosive poisons such as lye, acids, fuel oil, alcohols" (Activated Charcoal Cures)

 

I save partial onions all the time as well, and never got sick from them. I'm the only one in the house who eats them in any quantity so sometimes they're saved for quite a while in the fridge, perhaps even diced up in a plastic baggie or container.

It could just be the placebo effect making people who put onions by the bed better. Placebos are powerful things sometimes and I really think this is one example.

 

Yeah I wouldnt rely on campfire charcoal for serious poisoning but if its your only option its better than nothing. It is however useful for digestive upsets of all manner such as vomiting, diarrhea, heartburn/acidity, etc. Vomiting and diarrhea of course can be quite deadly quite quickly in a survival situation so knowing that campfire charcoal can alleviate it, can be life saving info.

 

While this is a nice little story about the 1919 flu, it is just that, a story. It cannot possibly be true because you can’t see the flu virus with an optical microscope! Even the best oil immersion compound microscopes today can only see a particle about 1/2 micron (500 nanometers) in size, and the flu virus is approximately 50-120 nanometers in diameter, that would have been a HUGE feat for emerging technology at that time. And the electron microscope, which CAN see the flu virus was only invented in 1933!

In fact, in the book The Great Influenza: The story of the deadliest pandemic in history one of the top researchers of the flu virus at that time had become an epidemiologist only because he had a microscope and most of the other medical students did not - and if you wanted to use a microscope in medical school, you had to have your own!

Also in the book, much of the stories of the several scientists working on creating a flu vaccine centered around their frenzied attempts to identify the causative agent behind the pandemic. The researchers just knew that it was caused by some sort of microorganism, but using all of the resources of the top universities and laboratories of the time, they could not identify it. At one point, they were able to filter out a liquid that made ferrets sick with a flu-like illness when they injected it into them. And bingo, they had the beginnings of the first flu vaccine.

But at that time, no one had actually seen the flu virus. Only until later during the epidemic did someone come up with an advanced staining technique that allowed the virus to be seen, but this was still a complicated hit-and-miss technique that a rural doctor with a hand-held microscope and an onion could not have POSSIBLY been able to accomplish.

Chapter 1: The Microscope - Introduction

 

Onions don't last long enough around here for me to check this out.

We go through 3# of fresh and ¼# of dehydrated per week (not counting pickled and canned).

We also go through a LOT of garlic.

And potatoes

 

And LOTS of breath mints! :lolsmash:

 

No big deal...

Dice the leftover onion, bag and freeze. Use as needed for stews, burgers, etc.

 

Onions not poisonious

Hozay:
Ed lied to you outright and he knew it. Why, he is trying to direct attention away from the mayonaise. It isn't the mayo, it is the onions. If it isn'y the onions it is the potato. If it isn't the potato it must be the pickle or mustard or or or?
Oniions contain sulphur. Sulpher was used by Doctors as an antibiotic until the 1950's. It was replaced by modern antibiotics.
If you leave amyonaise unrefrigerated it will break down or seperate and develop a disagreeable taste. How soon, it all depends on the temperature of the area where the mayonaise sits.
People who home can put citric acid in certains items they can to prevent spoilage.
Vinegar as we know is put in mayonaise which will help reduce bacteria growth. Yes know that is not the main reason.
Between 3 - 5 years ago food manufacturers and processers incresed the amount of sugar in their products. Sugar iss more addictive than alcohol, cocaine, meth, marijuan and heroin combined.
Last week I was grocery shopping for mayonaise. Since I am diabetic and with ther recent increses of sugar in foods I check all labels for sugar content. Two different mayonaise brands listed sugar as the first ingredient.
Does the sugar increaset the chances of bacterial growth? I don't know, but we all know sugar provides a great medium for bacteria growth.
I have no idea of the sugar content in Mullin's Mayonaise but it is obvious that Ed is a liar.