Comments on: Kitchen Follies: Can’t Caramelize Onions To Save My Life

By: Yamahomo

Yamahomo — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 19:57:43 +0000

Yeah, leaving kitchen while making caramelized onion is a big no no. But in the beginning of cooking, if you put a lid on the pan, you can leave for like 15 minutes. They get really tender and once you smell little burning, there's no leaving the stove until it's done. Kayoko, cooking is all about attention. Unless you are stewing or simmering something, you just have to be there. About sugar, I don't do it, but I heard it accelerate the process but I usually put it once it starts caramelizing.
Having said that, the quickest way to caramelize onion is after you cut your onion, place them in collander and dump salt on, leave it for like 15 minutes. That will extract a LOT of water out of onion before cooking, and that saves a lot of time caramelizing.

By: Copperchef

Copperchef — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 17:04:45 +0000

I've never added sugar before and I also don't leave the pan for more than 1 minute. Usually I'm just doing something else in the kitchen and I give it a shake or stir. I caramelize Vidalia onions too but that has lots of sugar.

By: pheel

pheel — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 21:55:14 +0000

Another vote on not adding sugar. If you must add some then doing so at a latter stage should not cause as much burning. Adding a little baking soda speeds the whole thing up: http://blog.khymos.org/2008/09/26/speeding-up-the-maillard-reaction/

By: kayoko

kayoko — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 16:47:39 +0000

that's what the dude in the vid told me to do!!! if not that guy, then some other recipe. so are you saying that they burned cause of the sugar? will try it without next time, thanks for the tip.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 15:29:14 +0000

just curious why you added the brown sugar. the natural sugars in the sweet onion usually can create that yummy caramelization on their own and dont need the close monitoring that any added sugar would require:/