I can't grow onions because my soil contains white rot. I might occasionally buy a big white onion to make Marcella Hazan's onion and butter tomato sauce, or for a pasta bake or for patatas a lo pobre (poor man's potatoes, a superb Andalucian dish). Otherwise I've taken to using banana shallots instead of onions for almost everything. They cook down much more quickly and have a lovely sweet flavour. Red onions take ages to cook down and I absolutely will not eat raw onion in any shape or form. I gave up decades ago on those disgusting pub "ploughman's lunches" with their cheap cheddar hunk, wilted lettuce and cucumber and raw cabbage and onion slices. I'll use spring onions in a recipe if I really have to, but do not ask me to eat a raw one. I once grew a six-pound-plus onion for our local flower and produce show. I wiped the floor with all the opposition and the judge told me that it was the biggest onion he'd seen in years. Once home, I decided to cut it up and cook it. No way, José. It was bloody disgusting.