Cooking onions without carmelization
Is there a way to cook onions in recipes that won’t have them release a lot of sugar like cooking them in liquid. I am on a very low carb diet and am not allowed onions as they apparently release too much sugar when Caramelized
Best Answer
Try lightly boiling them in broth or stock. They won't caramelize (as long as you don't let the liquid evaporate completely); but they will soften and become translucent.
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How do you cook onions without caramelizing them?
The first method, which involves very slow cooking, results in onions whose cells have broken down so far that they almost form a paste. They brown slowly and evenly, almost from the inside out. The second method cooks the onions more quickly over higher heat so that they brown before they have a chance to break down.When should you not caramelize onions?
5 Mistakes to Avoid When Making Caramelized OnionsShould I caramelize onions?
Onions are naturally sweet; and as caramel comes from the simple cooking of sugar when you slowly cook onions over an extended period of time, the natural sugars in the onions caramelize, making the result intensely and wonderfully flavorful.What can replace caramelized onions?
The Best Simple Onion SubstitutesMore answers regarding cooking onions without carmelization
Answer 2
Ironically, true caramelization will convert the sugar into something that is no longer sugar.
As for the low carb diet: there are many "more" carbs in a starch than in a sugar. This is because of the psychological magnitude of sugar vs. the starchy food. If you wanted to keep your carbs below, say, 35g per day then if you wanted a bit of sugar in your tea/coffee then you could splurge on over EIGHT teaspoons (16 cups of coffee??) to meet your carb limit in sugars. Whereas, if you decided to splurge on English Muffins instead, eating a single English Muffin would already blow your limit at 46g.
So, my low carb philosophy is that, as long as you are avoiding sugary foods, there is little value in managing the amount of sugar carbohydrate in otherwise healthy foods like carrots, tomatoes, etc. Rather, you should concentrate on identifying and avoiding danger areas like starch-thickened sauces.
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