When it comes to cooking delicious meals, onions are a staple ingredient of virtually every kitchen. They save a perfect balance of sweet and savory flavors that can change the taste of any dish they’re put in. Still, onions actually have so many more uses that go beyond the kitchen—as it turns out, cooking is just one of their many multi-faceted uses! Even if you’ve never considered using an onion for other reasons before, you just might want to after this list. With no further ado, here are 30 uses for onions other than just cooking.
1. Use an onion to prevent frost on cars.
If you live somewhere particularly cold, sometimes you know when a big frost is coming. As you may know, scraping your car off in the morning is an annoying task that nobody particularly looks forward to. If you want to get ahead of this trend, why not try cutting a raw onion and rubbing it on your car’s windshield? If you do this, the chemicals in the onion can help prevent the frost from forming at all.
2. Soak up the smell of paint.
If you’re doing any serious home renovation that includes painting, you know just how strong the odors can be in an enclosed space. To help absorb some of those strong smells, try putting a bunch of sliced onions in a bowl of water and and let it do its magic. Leave the window open as a bonus—in no time at all, that smell should be gone!
3. Clean a barbecue or a grill.
If you use your grill a lot, it’s bound to get grimy and greasy and whatever else. Although you can put a ton of elbow grease into scrubbing everything down, there’s actually an easier way. All you have to do is heat up your grill. cut an onion in half, stick a fork in the back of it and scrub it down. The chemicals will cut through the grease and when you’re done, you can give it all a quick rinse to get rid of the onion flavor.
4. Keep caterpillars away from your garden.
If you’re trying to grow herbs and keep finding your plants eaten up by pests, there’s actually a simple solution that doesn’t use chemical pesticides. To keep the caterpillars at bay, try soaking some grated onion in water overnight and then put the onion water into a spray bottle. Spray your plants down with that and watch as the bugs stay away.
5. Use onion to get rid of rust on scissors and utensils.
There’s nothing worse than seeing your tools get rusted from overuse or from being cleaned infrequently. As it turns out, though, there’s a cheap way to bring them back. All you have to do is cut an onion in half and rub it all over the rusted areas. After that’s done, scrub the knife off and it should be good as new.
6. Use onion to make a natural dye.
If you want to dye your own fabrics and you’re looking for a cheap, non-artificial way to do it, try this method! All you have to do is take a bunch of yellow onion skins and steep them in some water on your stove for 30 minutes. When that’s done, take the skins out and let the water cool. When it’s ready, you’ll be able to dye anything a natural yellowish brown color.
7. Fix the flavor of burned rice.
If you’ve ever been cooking rice and doing other things at the same time, chances are you’ve accidentally burned a few pots of rice. Assuming you haven’t completely torched the entire pot, you can actually reuse the not-burned rice if you use some onions to do it. All you’ll have to do is put the unburned rice in a new pot and add in some onion peels. Cover it all with a lid and let it sit for 15 minutes. After the time is up, most of the bad taste should be absorbed and you’ll be good to go!
8. Take the scorches out of your clothing.
If you’ve ever accidentally ironed something too hot or on the wrong setting and burnt something into your clothing, we get it—it happens to the best of us. Still, there’s actually an easy way to get those stains out of your clothes to make them look good as new. To do this, grate a little bit of raw onion onto the burned area and let it sit for about 10 minutes. When that’s done, wash it and it should be as good as new.
9. Keep your avocados from turning brown.
Eating your avocados when they’re perfectly ripe is a tough thing to do, no matter what the circumstances are. Still, there’s at least one easy trick you can use to keep them from turning brown after you’ve cut into them. To do this, all you have to do is store your cut avocado half with a cut red onion. Just try it out for yourself—it definitely works!
10. Use an onion to polish your silverware.
If it wasn’t clear from the tip we said earlier about rust, onions have some powerful chemicals in them that you can use to clean things. If you have some metal silverware that’s a little tarnished but not actually rusted, crush up some onion and water and use a rag to rub the mixture into your silverware. It should be looking fresh and new in no time.
11. Use onions to keep mosquitoes away.
Because of their strong scent and flavor, bugs tend to not like onions all that much. If you’re outside and there are plenty of mosquitoes around, try rubbing an onion on some of the exposed areas of your skin. Although you may need to take a shower afterwards, it’s sure to keep the bugs off.
12. Use one to cure your ear aches.
Though we all get the occasional ear ache, having a particularly bad one can be debilitating. Fortunately, you can take away some of the pain by using an onion. All you have to do is chop up an onion, put it in a sock and tie it shut. Put it on your ear and keep it in place. After a little while, the ear ache should go away!
13. Use onions to ease a sore throat.
Nobody wants to have a sore throat. Still, you may not always want to buy a bunch of cough drops and other medicines to help out. Instead, try making some onion tea! Simply throw some onion skins in a pot of water and boil it. After that, take it off the heat, take the peels out of it and drink a little bit as needed. Though it may taste strong, it’s sure to help.
14. Use onions to treat your bruises.
If we’ve been doing particularly hard physical work or we accidentally took a fall somewhere, we’re bound to get a few bruises. Though you usually just have to wait for them to go away on their own, all you have to do is hold a cut onion on the bruised area for about 10 to 15 minutes. Easy!
15. Use onions to heal acne.
Though everyone gets some kind of skin breakout from time to time, it’s still a serious inconvenience. Some people may have more luck with acne medications like Proactiv, but these don’t always work out. Instead, try chopping up some onion, mixing it with water and wiping it on the breakout areas. The acids in the onion should help to stop the outbreaks.
16. Keep ants away from your garden.
As we mentioned before, onions are a great remedy to keep pests out of your garden. Though they also work for caterpillars, leaving a few slices of raw onion around the ground of the garden can also help to keep ants away! This cheap method is great for anyone who wants an organic approach to pest control.
17. Soothe any itchy bug bites.
If you haven’t noticed the pattern yet, it’s pretty simple: onions are great for all kinds of different purposes! Just like the other home cures that relate to skin issues, all you have to do is cut an onion in half and place the cut end on the offending area. With any luck, you should start to feel better in no time.
18. Try using onions instead of smelling salts.
For anyone who doesn’t know, smelling salts are a real thing that people sniff to promote consciousness and wake back up again. Though they’re often used when people are fainting or about to faint, they can also be used at other times as well. What you almost definitely didn’t know, however, is that you can use a cut onion for the same purpose!
19. Put an onion on a burn to ease the pain.
Just like the other examples we’ve given, cut onions can even help alleviate the pain of a sunburn (or other burn). That’s because some of the chemicals in onions are natural analgesics, some of which can go a long way in making any burns you may have a little more manageable.
20. Use onions to take splinters out.
Though it’s impossible to always avoid getting splinters, it’s doesn’t always need to be so hard to get them out. If you have one that’s particularly hard to get out, try taping a small piece of onion over it for a little while. With any luck, the chemicals in the onion will carry the little piece of wood out of your finger.
21. Use the bag the onions come in to clean your sponges.
Though this one doesn’t actually use the onion itself, we’re still going to count it because it’s so helpful. The next time you get an elastic, mesh bag to hold your onions in, use part of it to clean off the gunky parts of your sponges! The fineness of the material is perfectly suited to the rough side of a sponge.
22. Use it to treat a fever.
Weirdly enough, they say that you can even use onions to fight off illnesses and fevers. To do this, all you have to do is cut up some onion and rub the bottom of your feet with coconut oil. Once you’ve done that, wrap your whole foot in plastic wrap and let the chemicals draw out any toxins and bacteria your body might be hiding.
23. Try using an onion to prevent vomiting.
Although we’ve already gone over some of the uses of a simple onion tea, it turns out that preventing vomiting is another one! To do this one, grate some onion and squeeze the juice of it through a cheesecloth. Mix it into some peppermint tea and drink a couple of teaspoons of it. Keep drinking it until you feel your stomach settle.
24. Use a cut onion to clean the air.
Because of onions many helpful properties, they go way back as a kind of home remedy. Though we’re not entirely sure about the science behind this one, they say that leaving a cut onion open in a bowl in a room can help clean out the air and absorb bacteria.
25. Use onion to take off warts.
Much like some of the other skin-related fixes on this list, you can even use a cut onion to help kill off any warts that you might have. Just as we explained with some of the other fixes, all you have to do is put a cut onion on any problem areas and let the chemicals work their magic.
26. Use it to soothe a colic baby.
Remember how we said you could make onion tea to help soothe your stomach? As it turns out, that remedy works on little babies with upset stomachs too! All you have to do is boil some water with onion in it, let it cool and give your baby about a teaspoon of it. In no time at all, he should be right as rain.
27. Use onions to stop hair loss.
Though you may already have many parts to your hair care routine, adding onion may help even more. To do this, all you have to do is boil onions in water and use the liquid as a pre-shampoo rinse. The chemicals in the water will strengthen your hair and keep your head looking brand new.
28. Use onions to loosen your chest congestion.
As an added benefit to this list, onions are actually a natural expectorant as well! If you have much congestion in your chest, crush up an onion and add some coconut oil to it. Mix it together and rub it on your chest. Just like something like Vaporub, the chemicals should loosen up any congestion you may have.
29. Use onion as a natural cough suppressant.
Though we already mentioned one way onions could stop you from coughing, here’s another one as well. First, take some onion slices and put a tablespoon of brown sugar on top of them. Cover them and let them sit for an hour before eating. This will make a natural relish that should help you stop coughing.
30. Use onion skin to help heal your cuts.
Last but not least, if you have any small cuts or abrasions on your fingers, you can even use some onion skin to heal those right up. All you have to do is use the fine, translucent part of the onion skin and place a little bit of it over the cut. The chemicals in the skin will kill any bacteria and clean up your finger in the mean time.
As you can probably see by now, onions are one of the most versatile things out there when it comes to home remedies. Although we’ll never say no to some perfectly caramelized onions on a burger, we’re definitely going to be putting some of these hacks to use in other ways. Have you given any of these a try for yourself? Which ones are your favorites? Let us know in the comments.
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When it comes to cooking delicious meals, onions are a staple ingredient of virtually every kitchen. They save a perfect balance of sweet and savory flavors that can change the taste of any dish they’re put in. Still, onions actually have so many more uses that go beyond the kitchen—as it turns out, cooking is just one of their many multi-faceted uses! Even if you’ve never considered using an onion for other reasons before, you just might want to after this list. With no further ado, here are 30 uses for onions other than just cooking.
