What are Madras onions?

hfot2

What are Madras onions called in English, American, Hindi, Telugu...?

I have a cookbook with several recipes calling for Madras onions, but nowhere is there an explanation of what they are.

Searching the web, I find any number of recipes for Madras onion chutneys and the like. Nearly all start off by whacking up a lot of perfectly ordinary yellow onions. Only one recipe specifies baby red onions or shallots.

Shallots seem like a good bet: there's a site offering to sell me bottles of Mother's Madras Onion Chutney, or some such; and the picture on the label looks very much like shallots.

So, are Madras onions really shallots?

abracax

Shallots they are. Don't see many other kinds of onions in south India.

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Nick-H

Sambar onions?

They are very small red onions, less than one inch.

Digital Drifter

that's right. Sambhar onions or shallots.

http://www.thehindu.com/mp/2007/06/1...1450610300.htm

This is how they look.

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Nick-H

Shallots, in UK English, are not red. They are small, white onions, about twice the size of sambar onions.

Digital Drifter

Still, when we don't use UK English, it's shallots? The wikipedia article on it, says the french call it shallots. So, what is it called then in the UK? Or that no one was arsed enough to think up a word for it and just left it as bloody onions.

Nick-H

Oh, the French?

What do they know about onions?


...But seriously, I never encountered those tiny, red onions until Indian shops came along. I think they are called "small red onions"!

And that, as they say of the Lady, that'sha lot

Haylo

Shallots have a milder flavour than onions, and unlike onions, all kinds of shallots grow as a cluster around a central bulb, in the same way as garlic; it's easier to use the botanical names to avoid confusion, the links have photos which will help too.

The white ones we get in the UK are usually varieties of Allium oschaninii.

The Indian ones are usually varieties of Allium ascalonicum.

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Nick-H

Ahhh... Haylo, with the inside information!

Thanks

Haylo

I used to have an allotment, before the travel made it unfeasable.

One day I'm going to tear up my passport and get a house with a bigger garden, and a pond and koi and a greenhouse and a vegetable plot and cherry trees and a mulberry tree and....

Not just yet though, I've still got itchy feet.

hfot2

Thanks to all. Now I know from Madras onions.

So now, are those wonderful little onions put out as soon as we're seated in restaurants the very same Allium ascalonicum? Love 'em. Even better, Distaff hates 'em, so I get to gnarf the lot.

Haylo

Not sure what they are, I don't recall being given anything other than sliced onions in Indian restaurants. Are they served whole, and look like this? If so they're probably silverskin onions, which are Allium cepa, though they could also be pearl onions, but I'm not entirely confident of the difference.

Hurray for distaff halves who don't share the same tastes. I'd love to have a partner who didn't enjoy eating EVERYTHING that I do, except from brussels sprouts and spinach.

Nick-H

Two of my favourite things

There seem to be a number of different plants here, all of which look entirely different, but which taste roughly like spinach.

No Brussels Sprouts though

Haylo

Brussels sprouts are my favourite veg, but I'd still prefer it if dukkha hated, for instance, chocolate.

Not surprised there isn't a "sprout substitute" in India, they are rather unique - in fact now I come to think of it, there isn't another veg that tastes anything at all like sprouts.

Nick-H

Have seen them here, but not for a while