Why do onions make you cry,and who discovered that we can cook with them.?

Question

Why do onions make you cry,and who discovered that we can cook with them.?

Answer 1

Sulfuric Acid is released when the onion is damaged, the more it is cut up, and the older the onion determines how much acid is released.  Sulfuric Acid bonds to the water in your eye and creates the burn.

Answer 2

The gases released from cut onions resemble a sulphuric acid that will "attach" to the closest water source (usually your eyes).  If you refrigerate them first, your eyes won't water as much.  I also cut them on a board next to the sink, with the faucet running, and my eyes never water.....

Answer 3

When the onion is cut the cells are damaged releasing a gas which we can't handle. From Wiki:  Sulphenic acids are unstable and spontaneously rearrange into a volatile gas called syn-propanethial-S-oxide.

Wear safety glasses when cutting--seriously...That is what Alton Brown swears is the only thing to prevent it.  Makes sense, does it not--if your eyes are completly covered it has no way to reach them.

As to who first discovered cooking with them?  Oh, my, come on.  They've been around forever!!

From Wiki:

It is thought that bulbs from the onion family have been used as a food source for millennia. In Caananite Bronze Age settlements, traces of onion remains were found alongside fig and date stones dating back to 5000 BC.[5] Onion is native to South Asia, and is widely used in Indian cuisine.[6] However, it is not clear if these were cultivated onions. Archaeological and literary evidence such as the Book of Numbers 11:5 suggests cultivation probably took place around two thousand years later in ancient Egypt, at the same time that leeks and garlic were cultivated. Workers who built the Egyptian pyramids may have been fed radishes and onions.[5]