Spring Onions: Early Spring’s Clever Hero

Spring onions don’t usually get much attention. They sit in the supermarket all year round, modestly labelled “salad onions” as though they’re destined only for a bit of garnish. But this often-overlooked vegetable has a long, surprising history and deserves a little more credit.

In Britain, the name “spring onion” began appearing in the 16th century to describe onions harvested young, just as spring begins delivering the year’s first fresh greens. After a long winter of sturdy root veg and stored produce, those small, tender green shoots must have felt like a tiny celebration of the warmer days ahead, a sign that the soil was waking up.

Their story stretches back even further in other parts of the world. In China, variations of spring onions show up in literature more than two thousand years old. Traditional medical texts describe them as a “warming” food, used to help push out cold and damp. Some communities even use them symbolically: the Mandarin word for green onion, cōng, sounds like the first syllable of cōngmíng, meaning “clever”. Because of this, spring onions sometimes make an appearance on the first day of school, or the new school year, in the hope of a successful academic journey.

Nutritionally, spring onions bring plenty to the table. They contain vitamin C and vitamin K, as well as plenty of micronutrients and phytochemicals, believed to support the body’s defences. The leafy green tops are rich in vitamin A, a reminder that the best bits are often the parts we’re tempted to trim off and discard. A handy tip: keep a bag in your freezer for carrot peels, onions trimmings, celery, leeks, mushrooms and herbs. Once full, they make a nutrient rich, zero waste stock.

Because they’re harvested young, spring onions cook quickly and have a gentle flavour that works well in countless dishes. Even better, they’re endlessly renewable: cut off the root end, pop it in a pot of soil on a sunny windowsill, water every few days, and you’ll be rewarded with home grown spring onions in a week or so. Pan fry whole, char on the barbecue, thinly slice and stir into a buttery mash to make champ, or toss them into a quick stir-fry. However you use them, you won’t regret elevating their position from ‘garnish’ to ‘main event.’

So, next time you buy some Spring Onions, think outside the box and try them in something like my Spring Onion, Charred Corn and Red Pepper Pancakes, rather than just your salad. You won’t regret it!