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Onion Peelings, Their Use

Eggs boiled with onion peelings and finished with oil for a glossy finish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 34% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 23,333 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Onion Peelings, Their Use

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the eggs and dry them carefully to avoid cracking.

  2. Place the eggs in a saucepan with plenty of onion peelings.

  3. Add enough cold water to cover the eggs.

Cook and finish

  1. Bring the saucepan to a boil and cook for 10 minutes.

  2. Remove from heat and let the eggs cool.

  3. Once cool, take the eggs out and wipe them with a towel that has a few drops of oil to give them a glossy appearance.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Onion + eggtop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together23,333 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

Onion and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 23,333 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
The main ingredient, which the onion peelings color as they cook in the water.
Red onion peelings
Release pigments into the water that tint the shell a deep brown or amber.
Oil
A few drops on a towel add a light sheen to the cooled shells.

The step that matters

Let the eggs cool before handling. Cooling in the water after boiling makes the shells contract slightly and firms the whites, which helps the eggs peel cleanly and keeps them from cracking when moved.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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