'Strawberry' onions not so sweet

Well, Mom gave me Grandma's recipe for her freezer pickles the other day so I had to make half a batch. Since I had already put up all of the Vidalia Onions, I pulled one of my white onions from the strawberry bed to use. Slicing them thinly for the freezer pickles, I popped a piece into my mouth...just had to see if the experiment worked...Nah! I guess the ol' sulfur in our Midwest soil wins out. The strawberries just didn't seem to do any good. I'll bet the people who make such a claim for interplanting onions with strawberries must already live in an area with less sulfur.

Here is the recipe for the freezer pickles:


Grandma’s Freezer Pickles

2 Qt. thinly sliced cucumbers
2 Tbls. salt
2 medium onions, thinly sliced

Sprinkle salt over the sliced cucumbers and onions. Let set for 30 minutes then drain off salt water.

Syrup-

1 ½ cup sugar
½ cup vinegar

Bring to a boil long enough to melt sugar. Remove from heat and let cool.

Pack cucumbers and onions into four pint jars. Mix 4 tsp. celery seed into syrup then pour into pint jars. Leave some head space to allow for expansion. You can use canning lids and rings or plastic lids. Freeze the pickles and you can eat them the next day if desired. Leave in the freezer until the day you want to eat them.

Why Can't I Grow a Sweet Onion?

The following is an exerpt from a newspaper column written by Jan Phipps, Master Gardener Extraordinaire. She writes in behalf of the Edgar County Master Gardeners. This appeared in the Paris Beacon in January of 2001. I think Jan wonders where on earth I come up with some of these gardening ideas (such as strawberries making onions sweeter)...well, in this case it was on the internet-- and you know that if its on the internet, then it must be true! LOL! We are both waiting on pins and needles to see how my 'strawberry' onions turn out this year.

WHY CAN’T I GROW A SWEET ONION? You buy onion seed or onion sets advertised as “sweet”, or advertised as the same seed used to produce Vidalia onions. You plant them, grow them, harvest them, and dry them according to the directions. The big moment arrives. You take a bite of your expertly grilled hamburger with a deliciously thick slice of onion expecting that sweet Vidalia taste but get the same hot zing of every other onion you have ever grown. Why? Two reasons: the growing conditions and the soil in Edgar County. Vidalia onions are a yellow granex type F hybrid grown in many areas of the country, but only in a 20 county region of southeast Georgia are the weather and soil conditions just right to produce the mild, sweet flavor. In Georgia onions are grown in the winter, in sandy soil that doesn’t hold sulfur, and are affected by the amount of sunlight, heat and water of that region. In Illinois we grow our onions in the summer in heavier soil. Sulfur is trapped in the soil and is what gives an onion its heat. Therefore, gardeners living in the southern part of Edgar County with sandier soil probably have the best chance of growing an onion that has the least amount of burn. Everyone else will have to be content with hot onions.

Strawberry Onions

Today I interplanted my onion sets into my new strawberry bed. I found in several 'companion planting' sites that the onions are supposed to help protect the strawberries from pests and the strawberries supposedly will give the onions a sweeter flavor. I still have two of the three types of onions left, so I think I will try planting them elsewhere for comparison's sake. So fun to experiment!

I love the idea of companion planting...and so many other gardening ideas to explore...so much to learn. Crop rotation along with companion planting makes things a little more challenging and fun. For example; my June bearing strawberries will remain in the same bed for three to five years (or more). If the strawberry-onion pairing turns out to be valid for me, then how would I rotate my onions? I guess I would need a new strawberry bed every year. If I grow day-neutral or everbearing strawberries, then I could keep the onions with the new strawberries if I treat them as an annual. But do I need to treat the day-neutral or everbearing strawberries as annuals here in Illinois? Being frugal, I would have to say that I would not turn them in after one year. I would have to over winter them and see what happens.

I only have so many places that I can move a strawberry bed, especially if I am supposed to avoid any area that has had other Verticillium Wilt susceptable crops in the last four or five years.