The easiest way to chop an onion is the proper way – the way that chefs do it. Like all new techniques, it takes a bit of practice and a sharp knife. A good chopping board is important too. This will give the onion stability and make it safer for you to chop.
Otherwise, you can buy bags of frozen chopped onions from the discount supermarkets so if you really CBA, I’ve experimented with them and they are perfectly fine for most of my recipes.
Method
Brush off any brown skin that’s about to fall off the onion.
Cut the top off the onion and slice through the root at the bottom keeping the onion together. If you don’t do this, then it will all fall apart when you try and dice it.
Cut the onion in half from root to tip and peel the brown skin off.
Place one half of the onion face down on a chopping board and carefully make a couple of even slices parallel to the board. Then make a couple of even slices down through the onion root to tip (ie. at 90 degrees to the chopping board) being careful not to go through the root.
Finally thinly slice the onion through to make small dice.
Then do the other half the same way.
Note on onions and crying.
Onions contain a chemical irritant that can make your eyes water. I find home grown onions tend to have me in floods of tears but the supermarket onions are usually (not always) a bit kinder. There are gadgets on the market that swear they can stop you crying but I’ve never seen a convincing one. Soaking the onions first will make them mushy. Or you can buy frozen pre chopped onions if you want to save some effort and time.
If you like this page, you might like my You Tube videos where you can watch me cook some great recipes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie2G-B-rW9w
Here are some links to my other pages too: https://cookingwithfi.com/home-made-chicken-and-mushroom-pie/