Book of Days Tales

World Teachers’ Day is held annually on this date to celebrate all teachers around the globe. It commemorates the anniversary of the adoption of the 1966 ILO/UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Status of Teachers, which sets benchmarks regarding the rights and responsibilities of teachers, and standards for their initial preparation and further education, recruitment, employment, and teaching/learning conditions. The Recommendation concerning the Status of Higher-Education Teaching Personnel was adopted in 1997 to complement the 1966 Recommendation by covering teaching personnel in higher education. World Teachers’ Day has been celebrated since 1994.

This is a day to celebrate how teachers are transforming education and the world, but also to reflect on the support they need to fully deploy their talent and vocation, and to rethink the way ahead for the profession globally.  If you have not done it yet, send a thank you note to a favorite teacher !!! 

Instead of a recipe today I am going to give you a lesson on the onion family.  Yes, I am a teacher – as were my parents and my elder sister; and my son is now.

The Onion Family

The important thing about the onion family is that just about all members, with the exception of garlic, are interchangeable. Using leeks instead of onions, for example, can fundamentally change a dish. Make French Leek Soup in the same way you make French Onion Soup. Or use a mix — chives, shallots, and green onions in place of plain onions.

1 .The onion family (genus Allium) has many brothers and sisters, many of which are under-used in home cooking. Learn about ALL of them and don’t be afraid to change one for another in a recipe.  My commonest substitution is to use leeks in place of onions. But you can also use caramelized scallions in place of onions in stews.

2. Use chives more often.  They are a perennial that quickly spread and provide years of enjoyment in the garden as well as the kitchen because of their profuse flowers in the border.  I use them most commonly in egg dishes and salads, as well as a soup garnish.  They come in several varieties, including garlic chives and Chinese chives, each with distinctive flavors that enhance soups, stir fries, and salads.  Don’t forget, too, that the flowers are edible.  They make a colorful and delicately pungent addition to a green salad.

3. Onions change flavors dramatically depending on how they are cooked. I tend to distinguish four categories – raw, translucent, amber, and dark. Each imparts a different flavor to a dish. I use a very fine dice of raw onions in soups and stews sometimes, added almost at the last minute. You will be amazed at how much this practice brightens up the flavors.  A SE Asian favorite is to deep fry onion threads until they are dark and crisp. Drained and dried of excess oil they will keep in an airtight container for weeks.  They are marvelous sprinkled over rice or curries.

4. Shallots tend often to be forgotten, perhaps because many cooks do not know what they are or because they are expensive. They look like small, brown-skinned onions shaped much like big garlic cloves.  To my mind their best uses are raw, finely chopped in salads, or deep fried in thin slices to a crisp golden and used as a garnish for beef stews..

5. Use leeks more. Try buttered leeks as a bed for fish. Slice both the green and white parts thinly on the diagonal. Melt a generous amount of butter in a heavy skillet and cook the leeks on a very slow flame for 15 to 20 minutes.  Plain poached leeks, cut into big rounds, make an excellent accompaniment for any meat dish. Put a few, cut into 4” lengths (white part), into the roasting pan along with whatever else you are roasting. Onions are great roasted this way too. A whole head of garlic roasted makes a delicious spread for toasted bread.

6. Green onions and scallions versus spring onions.  Scallions and green onions are the same thing with different names. They look like little leeks but taste like white onions.  Most varieties do not form a bulb.  Spring onions are like scallions except they do form a small white bulb.  They have their one varieties but can also be grown from regular onion seed or bulbs and harvested young.

7. All of the onion family (with the exception of leeks) are dead easy to grow.  Even if all you have is a sunny balcony, pot up some chives at the very least.  If you have a garden plot always devote a patch to onions.  They can be eaten at all stages from spring onions to fully matured bulbs.  Garden onions cannot be rivaled in cooking.